


In Due Course

by Anonymous



Category: Original Work
Genre: Breast Fucking, Breeding, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Double Penetration, F/M, Historical Fantasy, Intrigue, Knotting, Lactation Kink, Large Breasts, Large Cock, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Polyamory, Polyandry, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:47:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 33,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26115928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Georgiana lives a comfortable life. Her chiefest concerns are advancing her political causes and managing the estate that she is entitled to as a Lady, one of the few members of society reliably able to bear children. Served by several cavaliers, the feared and stigmatized fertile males, she is content.But there’s a war brewing, and she begins to realize that things were not as idyllic as they seemed as all that she built begins to crumble.
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Male Character
Comments: 3
Kudos: 52
Collections: Anonymous





	1. Reach

Connor's hand on the small of her back was both comforting and supportive. Without it, she would have been too ungainly to risk the outing; she was not unreasonable for all that she was, admittedly, stubborn and determined to have matters in hand before her confinement. Perhaps she ought not to have risked the pregnancy now, in the middle of the war, for all that she should still have both reach and influence once she was abed, and risked instead the illness from stopping it. There was a keen difference between the influence one might have through letters alone and what one might achieve with physical presence, one’s finger on the pulse. Had James' rut not hit him two months past and set the others off like a line of dominoes, she might be making arrangements to stay in the city rather than withdraw to the countryside to cloister herself and bear children she would have preferred two years hence. 

"We can leave," Connor said, dipping his head to her level to murmur in her ear. 

"We cannot," she dismissed, and resented the cut of her dress and the chatter in the room and the smell of whatever perfume Lady Percy was wearing which conflicted rather impressively with the fish that had been served earlier, still oily at the back of her throat. Despite the disadvantages, she wanted to be at the manor now, in familiar territory, not politicking and gathering the last intelligence she would get for a year. But her mood was not Connor's fault; indeed, he was only being kind and utterly attentive, as was expected of a cavalier to his lady.

"- but soon," she amended, as she straightened her shoulders and weathered herself for the incoming storm, for the general had swept in, the reason she had attended at all, and the tittering in the room paused briefly to pay him homage. Georgiana had not laid eyes on him since shortly before her first pregnancy, and admittedly, he was not much changed. He still had more presence than a plain man had any right too. Once more she puzzled at the twists of fate that had made her taciturn Connor a cavalier, but had left the gregarious and ambitious General Moncrieff mundane. She wondered if it troubled him.

She managed herself for a while longer unaided, though Connor's attention was on her and not on observing the formalities, ready to step in if she stumbled. But Georgiana had learned how to behave at her own lady mother's knee, and nothing so blase as the first trimester would prevent her from behaving as she ought. She used the time as he worked his way through the crowd to catch the mood of the room. Everyone wanted something from him, no matter their caste or lack thereof. That thought struck her, and she quickly reassessed the room. Besides herself, it was only Lady Percy and Lady Symington present, and their escorting cavaliers, though Lady Percy appeared to have her newest with her alongside one more experienced, whose name Georgiana could not recall. If she asked Connor, he would know. Still, the difference was stark, and one she would have noticed earlier if not rendered stupider by her distractions.

She caught Lady Symington's eye and held it, and the other woman cut short whatever conversation she was in the middle of with what looked like utmost politeness, and took herself and her cavalier, who Georgiana finally remembered was named Ernest, over to where she and Connor were standing. Their men exchanged polite nods, Ernest maintaining distance in utter respect of Georgiana's pregnancy, and she and Annette briefly touched fingers, as much friendly greeting as what was really a public gathering would permit. 

"My god," Annette said, in utter sympathy and low tones, "did all of them rush you, all at once?"

Connor colored, and something in his jaw tensed, but instead of making polite conversation with Ernest, who was looking amused, stared off into the middle distance.

"I am afraid so," she admitted, straight-faced. "James was early, and instead of being at sea..."

"He set them all off," Annette concluded, with a quick glance at her belly. The gold-spotted muslin swelled out before her, though in truth it was no more than a few inches at best and hardly indicative of what was to come. She might have laid a contemplative hand upon it, but it hardly needed more attention drawn to it. She had caught a few of the speculative looks other women had shot at Connor, and she did not wish to invite more of them. She felt especially possessive and sour today, and tamped down on the feeling for the sake of being good company.

"You look four months gone," Annette said, still quiet. 

"Two," she said, and Annette hissed in sympathy, as if she had not borne ten not two years ago, after she had been caught in a chain like unto the one Georgiana had suffered two months ago. Earnest shifted in his impeccable stance, and now it was he who would not meet Connor’s eyes.

"You'll have a dozen," the other woman predicted, and Georgiana closed her eyes in brief displeasure. She did not mind the getting or the bearing, or, in truth, the confinement. But it was inconvenient, now, when soon James would be at sea and Nathaniel and Stephan sure to be at the front. Her impulses were natural and by that, somewhat base and therefore overcomable, but still still felt them, and keenly. 

Annette touched her wrist, and her smile was all sympathy.

"It will pass," she said, and Georgiana sighed. 

"Come visit," Georgiana said impulsively, and did not hide her longing. "I intend to leave for the manor soon, and I will need the gossip, and the company of a good friend. And you must also want to see Stephan, I think.”

“Of course,” Annette reassured, and then looked away. "He is an awful correspondent, do remind him he owes his dear sister a letter. But ah," she said, "he approaches, and I would hate to be in your way."

Annette squeezed Georgiana’s hand for a goodbye, and went to lose herself in the crowd, Ernest following not far behind, after nodding at Connor.

Annette had impeccable timing, for indeed, the general was finishing up with his previous partners, and approached her. She did not need to look back at Connor to imagine his stern expression, his radiating displeasure surely felt by all who came close. Still, she would not rebuke him, least of all in public. 

"General Moncrieff," she said, and swept a curtsy that defied her condition. She was not some backwater breeder; she was the daughter of the formidable Lady Johanna Devereux, and she had interests to promote.

"Lady Devereux," he said, and took her hand, and pressed his lips to the back of her hand. He rose, and while she caught him glancing at Connor, he did not ask for an introduction. Connor, who had professed little interest in a military career, nor really any interest beyond the domestic sphere, would not gain any particular advantage in one. 

"It has been some time since we last spoke," she said, for that and the weather were always fair topics, as long as one was not able to move away from them to greater matters. "Congratulations on your promotion, though I suppose you have been wished that a dozen times this evening already.

"Two dozen," he said, but he was smiling, and she smiled back. "And nearly three years, by my reckoning. Too long to be deprived of your charming company."

"I am flattered to know you think so well of me."

The general laughed. "Only because I remember how well you dance, and your witty remarks lingered months in my memory."

"Then we must dance again, sir. I will even be so bold as to claim a dance in advance, come spring."

"You will have it," he said gravely.

"My, a promise from General Moncrieff," she said. "I shall cherish it always."

"I would hope the memory of the dancing would be held in higher esteem."

"But what is the promise but a debt for a future dance," she explained. "And along with it, the knowledge that I might linger in your mind is truly a delight, given the illustrious company that I would keep in your thoughts."

Connor touched the inside of her wrist, abruptly breaking the flow of conversation, and she turned to look at him. 

"Do you want something to drink?" he said, low, and it took Georgiana a moment to parse his meaning. To his credit, Moncrieff said nothing in the face of such rudeness.

"Yes," she told him, and he nodded and left her side. She was momentarily left adrift by his absence, though she composed herself with the surety that whatever inner turmoil she had felt at being without a cavalier had not shown on her face, nor had the shock at his interruption.

"One of yours?" The general asked, and Georgiana nodded.

"Connor Devereux," she said. Had he had a creche-name, she would not have given it. She was sure it would have meant little to Moncrieff as far as identifying Connor’s background, when Moncrieff had been the natural progeny of his mundane parents, like so many of those at this party. Like even so many in this city, and had very little interest in unwinding the arcane hierarchy of the estates.

"And where is Captain Devereux?" Moncrieff asked. "Unable to act as escort, I see."

"Awaiting orders," she replied. 

"Mine?"

"But of course," she replied. "He and Colonel Devereux both."

Setting aside the fact that Nathaniel was still smarting from his lack of promotion, he would obey orders. He was worse at hiding his feelings than Connor, and his annoyance would blaze red on his face and blare in his tone, but he would obey orders and fight to win. She considered mentioning Stephan, but he was too low in the ranks to affect the influence of the popular support Moncrieff needed to enjoy among the populace. That, and he was young. He should make his own name first. As Annette’s brother, he possessed a talent for getting noticed.

"I will pass Colonel Devereux my congratulations when I next see him," Moncrieff said, and maybe she did smile at that, one of her private smiles, and her hand drifted to her middle.

"Thank you," she said, sincere, and he continued on, "Though, I suppose you will be glad to be freed of your burden by the spring, when you can return to the city."

Georgiana took a moment, unsure.

He was not creche-born, and could not understand. She knew she would raise few of her children, nearly all of them given out to adoption at birth or foster once they were toddlers, but she intended to keep track of them. She loved them. But if every lady kept all her offspring, she would strain her own purse and the goodwill of the women less endowed around her. It built resentment, and resentment led down dark paths. So her own mother had said, and so she had committed to memory.

Seeking neutrality, she replied, "No one enjoys an early parting. I am fond of all my children," and Moncrieff smiled.

"Of course," he replied.

Connor reappeared over his shoulder, a glass in hand, and he offered it to her, cool and sweet. He returned to where he had been standing previously, his hand once more at her waist, solid and supportive. Moncrieff looked at him for a moment too long, and then bowed to Georgiana.

"No one enjoys an early parting," he repeated, "but I am afraid I must take my leave."

Georgiana nodded. He had not yet made his circuit of the guests, and she knew they were all far hungrier for his attention than she.

"I will want my dance," she said. "And send your wife my good wishes."

He smiled, and nodded, and went to speak to a man by the window. Georgiana sipped the drink Connor had brought, and tried not to deflate. At her back, his fingers rubbed circles, slow and soothing. She tried to muster up enthusiasm for the party, for the other conversations she should have, but even the whole of the glass did not make her feel anything but uncharacteristically claustrophobic and peevish. 

"I want to go home," she said, very quietly.

"Yes," he agreed, and she did not protest when he led her from the ballroom to fetch her cloak and call their carriage. She would owe the hostess an apology, but that was easily done, and better still, doable tomorrow or the day after, and by letter. Connor helped her inside the carriage, and sat next to her instead of across. She leaned her head on his shoulder, and he wrapped an arm around her waist. 

"I am so tired," she admitted, at last, though it was surely obvious to him. They had been in the capital for nearly three weeks now, and each day wore away a little bit more of her. Where was the vibrancy and sparkle that had come so easily on every other visit?

"I know," he said.

"I want to go to the manor."

"Tomorrow," he said. "I will make the arrangements tonight."

"Thank you."

Annette had been right. If she was this large now, two months in, she would be fit to burst by halfway through. And the house would be quiet, with three of her cavaliers gone and, knowing Richard, more like four. The damned war, James' damned early rut; she cursed them both with ease, and let the rumble of the carriage serve as the backdrop to her chorus of troubles. 

"Georgiana?" Connor murmured, and she tilted her face to look up at him. "We are here."

She nodded, and pulled away, but at every step, he was there, supporting more of her weight than was really necessary as she descended the carriage steps and then entered the townhouse on the quiet street. Her sense of relief when the door closed was complete. This was private, and she could drop some of her worries. 

No sooner did she have the thought was Connor on her, kissing her and backing her up against the foyer wall. The relief that jolted through her veins was immediate even as annoyance followed: not here, not now. Still, here was the comfort she so desperately craved, illogical as it was. She was safe and secure in her own territory. There was nothing more single-mindedly protective than a cavalier when his blood was up, and Connor’s blood was up, though from what she was not wholly sure.

She yielded to him, opened her mouth and let him push his tongue inside, wet, some spice lingering on his breath from the supper they had been served at the gathering and none of the damned fish. He pinned her, and she was reminded of his strength, the solidity of him. All of this spoke to the same insistent part of herself that had been so unnerved by being in such a crowd.

It was all animal instinct, and it was thus nonsense, but she could still be played like a fiddle by it. 

The fear drained from her even as he pulled away, a strand of saliva caught between their mouths before Connor swiped it away, wiping the back of his mouth with his hand and turned to duck his head. She was being uncharitable, and worse, she was being uncharitable to him.

Georgiana reached for his hand, and held it tight, tipping her head forward and pressing it against his shoulder.

“I need you,” she said. 

“I am here,” he said, and she smoothed out the rumples in her gown from her slouching and his assault, and they both stepped into the entrance hall, presentable enough. A lone maid waited further with a lit candle, surely alerted by the returning carriage, and Georgiana took it and dismissed her. Connor was by her side as they took the staircase up two flights and came to the lady’s suite.

By all rights, she could dismiss him, call for the lady’s maid to undress her, and spend the night alone, he in his own bedroom. But she wanted him with her, and so held his hand and tugged him along. She set the candle down on the washstand, and reached to undo the clasp of her necklace only for her fingers to brush Connor’s.

“Let me,” he said, and she removed her hands in mute agreement. The suite was old, one of the few her grandmother had managed to preserve, and the rubies were of a size that one could not obtain new, only reset from older pieces. The box had been left on her dresser, and when he had undone the clasp on the necklace, he turned away from her to fetch it. Georgiana handled the bracelet herself, and set it down on the velvet when Connor returned and offered it to her, the necklace already pinned back in place.

There was a broach, and a set of earrings also in the case. The return of the necklace and bracelet nearly completed the set. There was a tiara, but they were no longer allowed to wear such things and so it had been put away and was still in mama’s vault. She took the case from Connor’s hands and closed it, setting it down beside the candle. 

The rubies glittered, dark and saturated with their own color.

“Did you have a pleasant evening?” he asked, perfectly mundane, and Georgiana laughed, moreso at the break of tension than any real humor. She considered her brief meeting with Moncrieff, Annette’s offer, the half-dozen other small conversations she’d managed before the urge to leave had become all-consuming. There was normally a feeling of satisfaction after a night like this evening, the categorizing of names and faces, the review of idle conversation into what was useful and what was not. She liked gossip and socializing and parties. But Georgiana found she felt only that same tiredness and longing for security that had driven her out of tonight’s event with such unexpected urgency. 

“I am happy you were there,” she said, finally, which was truthful. Each of her cavaliers possessed both faults and virtues, and if she wanted a stalwart defender and escort, she would always turn to Connor, though he lacked some of the social graces that might have made it easier for him here. 

Turning back to face him, she took his hand and brought it to her breast. His initial impulse to pull away was halted by her hold, then his fingers settled, cupping her. She noticed the change in his breathing, the hitch, the way his gaze was now wholly focused on the neckline of her gown rather than her face. She did not want to talk. She wanted to be comforted. 

“Georgiana,” he murmured, and she tilted her head so he could scent her. There was something about the way he relaxed immediately at her smell, his shoulders slouching. The reactions among her cavaliers varied in their intensity, but they all traveled along the same route of dilated pupils and amicable tempers. Connor pulled away, and blinked slowly.

“Help me with my dress,” she said, and turned her back to him.

He could have undone the ties and hooks in a far more inebriated state. Now, his lingering was probably born of anticipation, the same impulse that bid one to open a letter slowly, savoring breaking the wax seal.

She stood still and let him push the fabric off her shoulders, lifting her arms out of the way and sliding her hands free of the sleeves. The dress held at her waist for a moment before the weight of the fabric pulled it down the rest of the way and she stepped free of it. Connor’s arm around her waist pulled her back, and she nearly stumbled, but it was only to fall back against him, and he was too solid for the movement to unsteady him.

He kissed her neck as he undid the ties of her petticoat and that, too, fell. There was still the matter of her chemise, her stays, but with each layer removed she felt more like herself. The room smelled like safety, though every cavalier scent that was not Connor’s was stale. Still, he was here, and when he bit down on her neck, she sighed in a buzz of relief and velvety silence. 

He eased off the pressure very slowly, and Georgiana, frayed around the edges, offered no resistance as he slid her stays off her shoulders, though she felt clumsy when she raised her arms above her head to help Connor pull off her chemise. 

He held her close again, nuzzling at her hair, still coiffed into an elegant style, his ribs expanding as he inhaled the scent of her hair, and she laid her arms over his where they crossed around her chest. 

“Georgiana,” he breathed, and she hummed a reply. She could feel him hardening against the small of her back, filling out thick and heavy, and tracked her own response with an idle, distant observation. Here was the heaviness in her chest, the tingling feeling in her fingers, the tightness in her breasts as her nipples stiffened. 

“You’re still dressed,” she noted, and Connor pulled away, only to rest his chin on the top of her head and drop his hands to her belly, the swell fitting easily in his palms.

“I am,” he agreed. He kept one hand below while the other rubbed circled against her skin, and after a moment, she placed her hand over his. 

“You will be back at the manor tomorrow,” he said, and he said it like a vow. “We are not the full force of all of us, but Richard and I will keep you safe.”

“I am safe,” Georgiana protested. She was. She was in good standing, was acquainted with all of the mundane politicians worth knowing and was related to or friendly with all of the ladies of consequence in the country. General Moncrieff, the hero on whom they all hung their hopes for western expansion and victory against the enemy, remembered her and wanted to dance and converse with her, which she would surely follow up on once she was fit for society after the birth. She had worked hard, just like she had promised James she would, following in her mother’s footsteps to protect their gains after the Rising and prevent another. The nausea and fear was only a symptom of the pregnancy, and a sign she needed to depart from good society promptly, like someone leaving a party after over-serving themselves before they made a rude remark. 

The desire in this moment, for Connor, for home, was far more genuine than either the fear or the nausea. 

“Will you have me?” she asked, and turned her head to gaze up at him. She did not anticipate rejection, ever, but his throaty reply of ‘yes’ was appreciated. 

As he bent to kiss her, she twisted in his arms to face him, and began to handle his clothes as he had done for her. The jacket she pushed over his shoulders, the vest she unbuttoned and nearly tore off. She did not mean to manhandle him, but he was here, and it had been days since she had allowed herself the intimacy. Connor was patient throughout, moved his arms to allow her to more easily strip him, though he had to break the kiss to remove his own boots, and she stumbled back onto the bed to watch him do so. His neckcloth was roughly flung to the side, as was his shirt, but he did not catch his fingers in the lace at the cuff. Now, years later, the clothing for his station was less cumbersome to him, but he did not need the ornamentation of fine clothing to shine in her eyes. She had seen him first in muck and covered in straw, clumsy in a body he had just grown into, and she wanted him now in this moment as much as she had wanted him then.   
  
He began to take down his trousers, and she lay back on the bed, sliding further from the edge but propping herself on her arm to allow her the view. He kicked himself out of his trousers and came to her so quickly she was blocked from drinking in the full view of him, but she could feel him against her thigh as he crouched over her on the bed.  
  
“Connor,” she said, and wound her arms around his neck. He kissed her, and she could feel the tension in his shoulder, how tightly wound he was. It was pleasing to make him wait, to feel him restrain himself, but even better was letting him loose. She let her arms fall away, and he pulled back, standing to his full height, his hand trailing from her thigh to her knee. He glanced from it to her, and she understood, nodding.

He was not as large as James, but he was thick, and he kept his hand behind her knee as he pushed her leg back. Georgiana held the other, splitting her open to his view. The position would be uncomfortable in a few weeks, and she would be back to her hands and knees or in their laps, but for now, this would do. Her cunt was well-accustomed to the intrusion, eager. She was soaked and flushed, wetness dripping down past her ass. Still, when he leaned down and pressed the head to her cunt, it almost looked as though it wouldn’t fit. A few days of going without would do that. At the manor, it would be less of a burden for the staff to handle the laundry, meaning they could go as often as they liked. Now, deprived of the chance for several days, Connor was reduced to keeping himself in hand while he pushed into her incrementally, slowly acclimating her to his size. 

Georgiana tossed her head back into the pillows and kept her eyes closed. Her breasts ached and bobbed with each movement she made, and if she was not so focused, she might have spared a hand to play with her own nipples. She wanted nothing more than Connor’s mouth upon them, but that was full of gritted teeth at the moment. She could not squirm, nor reach for the pillow, nor do anything but feel as he slowly pushed inside her, measure after measure of hot flesh swallowed into her cunt. It was only a matter of patience; she was made to take him or what any of them could offer her, and want more.

And then he pulled back, and thrust in once more, her eyes opening to see his cock wet with her slick and him damp with beaded sweat as he began to fuck her properly. Her nails dug into her own flesh as she held her leg apart, with each thrust he managed a little deeper, and then more. The swell of her belly prevented the accustomed sight of seeing him press so deep he was visible below her skin, but she felt it, especially as he fit all of himself inside her, the slap of his balls against her ass as he settled into the short, sharp thrusts that battered against her cervix, the hard ridge of his knot already swelling near the base of his cock. 

“Georgiana,” he said, and each syllable was strung out between panting breaths. She meant to cry his name in reply but managed only a moan instead. Her hold on her sweat-slicked thigh slipped, but it hardly mattered, and Connor just moved both her knees over his shoulders without a thought as he pressed her to the bed. No, this would not be doable in another few weeks at all, but for now, it was glorious.

Connor’s eyes were unfocused, his mouth slack, a bead of spit dripping from his lip, but now, with a free hand, she could play with her own tits, heavy with the promise of milk to come. Drawn by the movement, his eyes refocused, and he dipped his head to suck in a mouthful of flesh, his tongue lapping against the pert nipple. He looked at her while he did so, all cavalier intensity, all that instinct to fight and breed being spent on her. Well, he’d succeeded on both counts, her belly and cunt both full, and now he could reap the whirlwind. 

Her clit was hard and insistent, and if she’d been in her right mind, she would have had him suckle it and work his fist into her before the main course, but she’d been impatient. Now, impaled, and him in a frenzy, she had to yield to his need, though she was sure he wouldn’t leave her wanting. 

“Connor,” she managed, finally, though it was more the hard consonant of his name. Still, it caught his attention, and he blinked slowly, heavy lashes fanning against his cheek, thrusting slowing for a moment as he looked her over. He was handsome, and strong, still built like a stablehand all these years later, and she should not have had a jolt of pleasure surge through her at the reminder of what she already knew. He was strong and he was hers and he’d give her big strong babies, and oh, wasn’t that an echo of her last heat surging through her?

The swollen, flushed nipple and the surrounding reddened flesh dropped from his mouth, wet with sticky spit, and he went for the other, subjecting it to the same treatment. Damp, every sensation was heightened, and Connor had found the spot inside her she liked best, hitting it with each thrust. Half crushed under him, she could manage no more than the sharp little noises he fucked out of her, animalistic and desperate. She was less a woman and more a collection of sensations; she existed best in the spots where they touched. His knot was near swollen to full size now; he would need to fuck it into her or suffer the consequences, and she knew the half-second before when he was going to do it, the stalled movement, and then the hard thrust when he drove it into her cunt, her back arching, only to be dragged back with him, now joined so absolutely. She came, everything alight, cunt tightening what slack was around his cock, and her breast fell from his mouth as he screaming, drowning out whatever little sound she might have made. 

Then his come, thick and hot and utterly useless to her, began to pump into her, Connor still lost in the mindless drive to breed. Georgiana didn’t mind. Everything was still hot and bright at the edges, tingling down through her breasts to her cunt to her kiss-swollen mouth, her skin all sensations that were pleasing to her. Connor moaned and kept pumping, which did nothing other than drive her against the bed in little jerks. Again, his eyes were sightless, rolled back, his mouth dripping. He responded to sensation, to her hands in his hair yanking him down so he would kiss her, her tongue swiping through his mouth, his spit dripping down her chin. Her belly was tight. She wasn’t in heat and couldn’t be, with no room for his seed, but he kept spilling, and when he pulled out, it would flood over the sheets, but that didn’t mean she didn’t want it. 

His jerky little thrusts grew less frequent and then stops, and then all he was was a comforting weight over her, still bending her in two, his sweat-slick skin against hers. 

“Georgiana,” he said after a moment, once his breathing slowed, and she released his hair, briefly concerned she might have torn some out during her passions.

“Hello,” she replied, and he grinned, though it fell from his face, replaced with concern and a wrinkled forehead. 

“Here,” he said, and pulled back, mindful of where they were joined. Gently, he helped her ease her legs off his shoulders and down to the bed, and when he leaned back down again, it was to slip a hand under her back and then roll over on the bed. The relief was instant, and then moreso as he helped her sit up astride him. Her thighs would ache for a while yet, but having the pressure off her belly was a comfort, even as the come sloshed inside her.

“Better?” he asked, and she smiled. “Oh, yes.”

“Did you- would you like to finish again?” He held her by the waist now, all seriousness. He no longer blushed when asking for such things for all that he was a wolf in bed otherwise.

“I don’t think I could manage it,” she admitted, but he shook his head. She considered, feeling how swollen inside her he was still, and then acquiesced with a nod. 

At her agreement, he stuck his fingers in his mouth, wetting the first two liberally and then applying that to her clit, rolling over the bud in measured strokes. Georgiana closed her eyes, shutting out everything but his touch, his steady hand on her waist, and rolled her hips as much as the knot would allow. Warmth bled through her, and she sighed. “Harder,” she said, and Connor obliged, the pressure of his fingers increasing. Georgiana simply followed, her eyes still shut tightly. She came again, softer this time, without the frantic energy of the earlier climax, like sliding into in a warm bath. Connor grunted, his nails briefly digging into her back, but he did not have the stamina for another round outside the mindlessness of the rut. Rendered content and even sleepy, Georgiana reopened her eyes to find Connor watching her, pulling his hand away to wipe thoughtlessly against the sheets before resuming his hold on her waist.

“Thank you,” she admitted, and he smiled briefly. Now, in unhurried indulgence, she could bask in his presence and he in hers. She did not understand the point of how the mundane fucked. Yes, it was pleasurable, and occasionally resulted in a child, both of which were points in favor. But the lack of intimacy must have been disappointing for the women, what with their men being able to roll away and carry on, leaving them behind so carelessly. True, Connor was not a conversationalist even in the best of circumstances, but he was here, under her, beauty in the absence of concern or sternness on his face, and that was all she wanted.

Time passed without comment. The curtains allowed some of the light from the street to play against the floor; carriages rolled by soundlessly, only their lamplight attesting to their presence on the street stories below. The single candle, now burning low, was the only other light in the room.

“If we leave at dawn,” Connor said, breaking the tranquil silence, “we will be home by dark.”

That was true, with another half-dozen caveats. If they packed very lightly, and took fresh horses, and left quite literally at dawn, they could make it back to the manor before dark. She did not need much from the wardrobe she kept here. Soon, none of it would fit, and she had no qualms about allowing the housekeeper to pack the jewelry and send it along later. Those were the extent of the concerns she was able to muster. More would occur to her once she was back at the manor, but they were the sort that could be handled by letter, which she already knew would be her main method of contact with the world outside her estate for the next year. 

“I thought that would please you,” he interrupted, and she shook her head. 

“It does,” she said, and realized she had been frowning. Georgiana shifted in her seat, and realized with no small measure of regret that his knot was nearly wholly shrunken, and that too much movement would let him slip free. She froze immediately, and Connor smoothed his hands down her thighs.

“Go ahead,” he said, and with a great deal of reluctance, she rose up, his cock slipping free and with it, a great deal of his seed, spilling over his lap like froth from a bottle of uncorked champagne. Georgiana winced, already feeling colder. Connor did not flinch, only waited until she was seated beside him before he rose at all, heading for the wash basin to wipe himself down and leave the stained cloth in the bowl. The candlelight flattered him, lit his back and thighs in chiaroscuro that drew her eye despite all the other distractions of the come sliding down her own thighs, sluggishly leaking from inside her. He brought her a damp cloth for her own use and a clean shift from the wardrobe, and she took it from him rather than allow him to help her. The soft linen was still rougher than his skin, and she would have slept nude if she had the option of waking later. Still, he turned back the covers for her and pulled them up. 

Georgiana pulled the pins from her hair slowly, unwinding her hair from the curls and dropping the pins into a dish by the bedside. Connor picked up his discarded clothes from the floor and began to dress again, leaving the vest and jacket on a chair, slowly and methodically returning himself to some sort of order, then taking the candle. His hair was still untidy from her handling, from dragging against the pillows, and she knew she would roll over onto a pin sometime in the night from her own mussed hair, but he was suitable to go downstairs and handle their travel arrangements. She loved him dearly for it.

Dressed, he turned to the door, and she said his name, letting it catch him like a fishhook. 

“Will you hurry back?” she asked, and played with the pin she had pulled free. She wanted him to stay the night here, rather than returning to his own room.

Connor opened his mouth to speak, but she was quicker. “Even if you wake me, I would rather have you here.”

The candle did not cast that much light, but she could still see his small smile. “As you wish.”


	2. Preparations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I struggled from the beginning as to if it was better to simply tag for every planned kink from the start, or to add tags as they became relevant. Besides major thematic tags, I've gone for the second option, ergo the new inclusion. Enjoy!

Oakley Park was always ‘the manor’ to Georgiana. It was not mama’s estate, the grander Devereux Hall, which Georgiana hoped might go to her own daughter eventually. But the manor was well-appointed, several hundred acres of parks and farmland and a few hundred tenants and villagers. It had been under the control of a government-appointed bailiff and mayor before it had come into Georgiana’s control, as most of the unoccupied estates were. The manor house itself had not been occupied by either man given the tenuous claim mama had on it through her aunt, Georgiana’s great-aunt, who had last been the lady of the property. But she had produced no daughters and died before Georgiana’s birth, and so it had come to Georgiana’s stewardship shortly after her seventeenth birthday, when it had only been herself, James and Connor, the ink on their contracts still wet.

Seeing the village as the road began to rise out of the valley was ever the cue that she was nearly home, and she tugged the curtain open to watch it come into view. The dotting of homes and cottages turning into shops, the village square, people walking and laughing and going about their days. Beside her, Connor shifted, and when she turned to ask him what troubled him, he reached past her to tug the curtain closed again.

“I need to be seen,” she said. “For comfort. I need to be seen well and healthy.” 

“Later,” he said, and at her frown, he reached out for her hand and held it. “After we arrive.”

After she had been delivered into the care of all five of them, after she had been fed and bathed and the great damned herd of them had assured themselves of her well-being and comfort. And then, in the morning, all but two of them would ride back in the direction she had just come from, for glory and country, and it would be months before she saw them again. It could have been worse. Mama had kept seven cavaliers at her height and before Georgiana’s birth, though that number was later whittled to three, but her great-grandmother had nearly two dozen, and her grandmother had been on her way to matching that number before the Rising, as had the great-aunt who had once been the lady of Oakley Park. 

As they made their way through the village and back into the wooded park that separated the two, Connor released her hand, and she tried not to let her emotions display on her face. No, five was enough. No pleasure and joy borne from finding a sixth who fit into her life. their lives like a jewel in a setting could make up for the increased care felt for her person. 

The house sat on a hill, three stories and orderly, with large windows and a nicely graveled drive that led up to the pillared entrance. It had suffered very little damage during the Rising, being next to larger estates and prizes. The fine stone wall that had once surrounded the property had been demolished, and the trees allowed to grow very close indeed to the borders of the small surrounding lawns. Behind the house were the outbuildings and the stables, the household kitchen gardens, pleasure garden, paddocks and pond, then the wooded park resumed. Oakley Park boasted a dozen bedrooms and a creche with room for thrice that, though she had so far only opened six of the bedrooms besides the lady’s suite, and only made use of seven of the tiny cradles. It was vast in every sense of the word, though it would have been dwarfed by the other great estates in their heyday. Management of the staff and the house took a great deal of time, and though it pleased her, she was aware that it was not at full capacity.

The staff were assembled outside when the carriage arrived, and then, by the main door, her cavaliers. James, in pride of place, with his naval uniform, then Nathaniel next to him, his colonel’s gorget blindingly shining in the late evening sun. Stephan, newly enlisted, did not bother with his uniform, but at least Richard, also dressed only as a gentleman, stood between him and the more senior men. 

“I would not blame you if you did not wait for the carriage to stop,” Connor said, and Georgiana realized her hand was on the handle. She drew it back, resting it in her lap. 

“It was that apparent?” she asked.

“The entire time,” Connor replied. Not, Georgiana hoped, to those whom she had called on during her time in town. She curled her hands into fists in her rapidly shrinking lap, and was surprised when Connor laid his hand on her knee.

“It went well,” he said. “But now you are home.”

“But now I am home,” she said, grimly, and exhaled, composing herself. The carriage pulled to a full stop, and Connor opened the door, holding his hand out so she could take it and step down onto the drive with all the grace expected of her.

Those assembled remained still as she and Connor approached, arm in arm, boots crunching in the gravel. James was the one to break the perfect tableau and step forward, at which Connor released her and stepped back. She tilted her head to the side, and James bent to scent the curve of her neck. His inhale was long and slow, close enough for his nose to brush her skin, but he remained proper, ceremonial, though Georgiana could imagine how his thoughts ran. Hers, she realized with a jolt, could quickly go the same way, guided by his warmth and smell, familiar and alluring all at once.

“Lady,” he said, straightening to his full height to make the bow when he gave it more dramatic, “welcome home.”

From beside him, echoing down the line, every cavalier but Connor repeated the greeting, as did the staff.

There were rules to follow, the guardrail between proper behavior and incivility, and lacking them had served as justification for the removal of many of the ladies of her grandmother’s generation. In this she had an excellent leash for her behavior, and so only took James’ arm, allowing him to lead her through the main doors and into the manor. Behind them, the staff scattered and returned to their normal jobs, but for the maid who took her cloak, and the footman who helped Connor with the same.

“Why did you have the staff turn out?” she asked as an aside. At least the cook hadn’t been among their number, which suggested there was a hot meal in her future. That thought thrilled her, after a cold and dreary breakfast of boiled eggs and rolls that managed to crumble between her fingers in the carriage. 

“Your right,” James said. “And we knew to expect you. Connor sent a rider that came early this morning.”

While the rest of the men had slipped in and now milled about the hall, nonchalant but for the glances they occasionally threw back, Connor had stayed closest, and she favored him with a smile. 

To the maid, she said, “Draw a bath,” and the young woman offered a curtsy and stepped away to presumably do so. 

“Why don’t I recognize her? Where is Anne?” she asked James, taking his arm again. He steered her to the right, through her sitting room, but stopping short of very welcome bedroom beyond. James exhaled.

Nathaniel cut in to answer. “She-”

A door slammed, and she jumped. James yanked her in closer, pulling her to his chest and turning on his heel. 

“Merely closing the door,” Richard said, folding his hands before him and looking very bored. 

“Quite,” Nathaniel said, and continued. “She resigned.”

Georgiana looked from Nathaniel to James, who nodded confirmation, his mouth grimly set. Connor looked just as puzzled. Slowly, and fearing the answer, she looked from Richard to Stephan. 

“Did you...”

Richard’s brows rose. 

“‘Did we’ what?” he asked, chilly. Stephan only stared back, more confused than offended. 

“Did either of you offend her?” She regretted it almost as she had said it, prepared for Richard’s stiff refusal and Stephan’s denial. “No, I- forget I asked. Where is she? What happened? She was the best of the maids. Did she marry? I did not know she had a sweetheart.”

“You did not hear?” James asked, then shook his head. She felt her stomach drop, and braced for bad news, swallowing. “No, the gossip must not have reached you. The province council has decided to limit terms of service at the estates to seven years.” 

“That’s,” Georgiana spluttered, glancing to the side as she did rapid math. “That’s nearly all the staff. What is the penalty? Is it a fine? We will find the money for it, surely. My god, we must, for the cook and the housekeeper alone.”

She understood now why this was a conversation for behind closed doors. 

“Charged not to the estate,” Nathaniel said, “But to the individual. The cook and the housekeeper will be able to afford it, but none of the maids and very few of the footmen. We could raise wages to encourage them to stay, but we cannot match what the girls would make if they chose to work for a mundane house, or decided to wed for the childbearing bonus.”

“Damn,” Georgiana said, shading her eyes with her hand. “Damn it all.”

The accounts would survive, but the idea of handling revolving maids already had her distressed. She wanted a bath and a hot meal and to sleep. The rest could wait until morning, until after she had sent her cavaliers off to war.

“This was meant to be a merry sendoff,” she said. Only awareness of the dirty on her clothes kept her from taking a seat on one of the couches and rubbing her temples until the ache left.

“No reason it couldn’t still be,” Stephan proposed. Georgiana turned to look at him.

“Annette is upset you have not been writing to her,” she told him, relieved that there was at least one task of which she could unburden herself. 

Richard stepped forward, and gestured to the bedroom doors behind them. “If we are finished,” he said, and Georgiana reasoned they were. She wanted to put the thoughts aside, and did so as she opened the doors to her bedroom. 

For practical reasons, a lady’s bedroom had to be large. In her mama’s house, she had a room of her own with her single bed and writing desk and all the other little accouterments a girl and then a young woman could have desired in proportion to her station. But it had not possessed two walls of windows through which light could stream, nor a high frescoed ceiling painted with idyllic pastoral scenes. The whole effect was like unto what Georgiana imagined stepping into a cloud was like. While she had replaced the wallpaper and the drapery upon reopening Oakley Park, her great-aunt’s choices regarding the rest of the room were still fashionable and delightful enough for Georgiana to have left them untouched. Compared to what had been hers when she was a girl, this was all still such a luxury to her, and she hoped it never lost the gilding.

Ignoring for now her little desk, at which she would have to write the letter to last night’s hostess to apologize for her hasty departure, she made for the room behind the bedroom, another legacy of her great-aunt. Once there, she began to remove the pins from her own hair, placing them on the marble-topped vanity. The maid from the entry hall had lit the fire and filled the tub, and was setting out the soaps and oils Georgiana preferred for her toilette. Georgiana paid her no mind, far more focused on the bodies crowding the doorway and gradually pressing into the room. To Georgiana’s relief, the maid hesitated only once, setting one of the bottles down with a sharp clack, then regained herself and finished her task.

“Nathaniel,” Georgiana said, fluffing out her hair now that the last of the pins had been removed. “Let her through.” 

Nathaniel did, stepping over the drain in the floor to give the woman space to pass by, which she did hurriedly, head down.

“While she is not Anne,” she admitted. “She is sufficient.” 

Quick enough to have slipped through the servant’s hallways to fill the tub with warm water and light the fire, and clever enough to get out of the way as quickly as possible. “Connor,” she called brightly. “You are absolutely filthy. Do come here.”

He did not so much step forward as get pushed forward, some general shuffling among the cavaliers disgorging him into the room where he nearly tumbled into her. She unpinned the front of her gown and supposed she might not have need for maids as much, given how it had become her or one of the cavaliers who ultimately ended up undressing her.

She unbuttoned her cuffs and slipped it off her shoulders, draping the fabric over her arm to fold it and then holding it out expectantly. Stephan, obliging, reached for it, and Georgiana dropped it into his arms. He stared down, momentarily puzzled, until Georgiana looked up from unbuckling her boots to say, “The bedroom, please,” and he realized he had to shuffle back through the crowd and into the other room to drop it off. 

Off came her boots, tucked against the wall, then her petticoats, her stays (these unlaced by someone’s helpful fingers), her stockings. Clad in only her shift, she turned back around to find them all waiting like dogs watching a roast being carved, waiting to see what would be tossed their way. 

“Connor,” she said again, more sharply this time, and he came to her, looking down. “You did,” she said, and began unbuttoning his jacket, “a very good job taking care of me in town.”

She tossed his jacket, then his vest, in the same direction she had her own clothes, sure they would make it to the appropriate laundry as needed. 

“Sit,” she said, pointing, and he took a chair next to the wall. He breathed through his open mouth, pupils blown wide, his cheeks flushed dark. He set his hands on the arms of the chair and curled his fingers tight around them. Georgiana took one of her discarded petticoats and folded it, to shield her knees as she knelt between his legs.

“Spread your legs,” she said, and they fell open. His balls rested on the cushion, dark skin against the pretty chintz pattern. With a hand loosely wrapped around his shaft, she lifted it out of the way so she could lay kisses along them. Connor shifted in his chair, but she laid a hand on his thigh and he stilled, self-control overcoming arousal. Slowly, carefully, she turned her attention to his cock, licking a wet stripe against which she pressed her cheek. 

Cavaliers could not usually find satisfaction by their own hand, doomed to painfully swollen knots that prevented ejaculation. Nor could they take anyone they liked to bed, for a fully-formed knot was usually the size of a grown man’s fist at minimum, or two, and the genteelly-bred women of the town were even less likely to try an attempt than the more familiar and wiser girls who had grown up around the creche-born. There were solutions for a cavalier who could not find a lady, and most of them were decidedly creative. 

The trick, Georgiana knew, for the five of them had been very easily persuaded into allowing her to experiment, was sustained pressure around the knot, and continued stimulation. 

Kneeling with her back straight, she lifted her breasts to rest on his knees, his cock resting in the cleave between them. Pressing them together with spread-fingered hands, they enveloped him in milky-pale flesh. 

She could not fit the head into her mouth, though she could still kiss the tip, swiping with her tongue to catch the oozing fluid. 

“It is alright,” she said, looking up at him. His chin had dropped to his chest, his hair out of sorts and hanging around his face. She could not see his eyes, nor could he see the picture she made. “Connor? Let me be sweet to you.”

Slick with water, and soon to be the copious amount of precome he leaked, his cock dragged through the hot tunnel her breasts made. She kept the pressure up, the flesh plump between her fingers, her nipples pert and flushed. Georgiana was all too aware of the eyes of the other cavaliers behind them, but she ignored them. This was just for Connor. He deserved a reward, or at least to be envied. 

“Connor?” she said again, and he exhaled, lifting his head. With his hands braced, he could thrust, if only shallowly. The exoticism of the act was arousing enough, the fat head smearing against her cheek when he thrust too hard, a wet swipe left in its wake. It was not her cunt, tight and hot and wet, but it was his lady on her knees, watching him, while he fucked her tits. 

Stephan’s voice piped up from behind her, curious. “Will she let us-”

“Quiet,” came Richard’s in reply. “Some of us want to watch.”

Connor kept stealing glances at her, his lip caught between his teeth, like some shy boy. The chair creaked, but not alarmingly, and she admired how well he kept himself in check.

“Look at me,” she said, and he finally obeyed. His restraint warred with his arousal, writ plain on his face between his gasping inhales and the fullbodied shiver as she licked her lips, and kept her eyes on his. Gradually, he grew more erratic, his teeth grit hard, the growl behind them barely leashed.

There were no more comments from the gallery behind them, though she felt the weight of their stares.

It was still no replacement for being inside her, but she kept him held tight between the heavy titflesh as his knot swelled as he came, crying out. His seed splattered in her hair, against her neck, dripped down between her breasts, and she felt each pulse jerk through his shaft, his hands whiteknuckled clenching the arms of the chair. Georgiana mouthed at the side of his cock, her tongue laving along the hard flesh. As he softened and he and the knot shrank, she was able to reach more, taking the head into her mouth and suckling the remains of his come out, bitter against her tongue. The only noise he made were little whimpers in response to the over-stimulation, but he never asked her to stop, or looked away.

Georgiana released him, aware of the redness of the skin between her breasts. She had to stand slowly, bracing herself with a hand on his knee to rise. The tension in the room was high. Frankly, the only cavalier not on the edge of either bloodlust or unbridled lust was Connor, but only because he’d just come. When they were like this, they functioned best when given orders.

“Richard,” she said, swiping her fingers against her cheek, “Help me into the tub.”

They came back wet. She licked them clean.

He offered his arm, like a gentleman, but his eyes were hard, analytical. She held it as she stepped into the water, then his hand as she sank into it. Bliss. She closed her eyes.

“There is soap on the shelf. Fetch the rose one, and the oil for my hair. Oh! And the nailbrush.”

Then she submerged herself. For a moment, it was perfectly quiet. All her aches were soothed by the hot water. But she could not hold her breath forever, and when she emerged again, it was to see Richard kneeling by the tub with the requested items. The oil she poured into her palm and began to work through her hair, combing with her fingers. Then came the soap, and the required scrub of her arms, her neck, her back. Her gaze landed on Connor, still seated but much recovered, and then switched to Stephan.

“Help Connor bathe,”she instructed him. He’d have to do so out of a jug, but they would make do. That left Nathaniel and James, the most formidable of her cavaliers.

“Nathaniel, come here,” she instructed, and he did. 

“Kneel,” she said, and he did.

James could not keep quiet for long.

“And me?” he asked. The look he gave her was so intense as to have a sort of physical weight, but she did not balk. Lifting one hand out of the water, she pointed at the chair Connor had vacated, knowing full well it stank of his arousal and would only wind James tighter.

“Sit,” she said, and paid him no more attention.

Richard’s fingers swept at the surface of the water, stirring little eddies, which were a source of great interest, going by Nathaniel’s attentiveness to the motion of his hands. Georgiana took the soap and the brush and lathered it up, setting to cleaning her hands and nails. Her breasts floated in the water, nipples occasionally breaking the surface as the ripples from her movements stirred the water. She could still fit in the tub, thankfully. There was nothing quite so restorative as a hot soak, though she would make do in the coming months.

Skimming down her back under the water, Richard’s fingers stroked her spine before moving between her cheeks and rubbing against her hole. Georgiana continued to scrub at her nails, inhaling deeply when he hooked two inside. His shirtsleeve was damp and drawing up water from the tub, but she did not mind if he did not. He did not thrust deeper, but neither did he remove them, apparently content simply to penetrate her and leave it at that. 

Nathaniel stood, surprising Georgiana, but it was only to undo his uniform jacket. The knees of the trousers were wet, and his cock, trapped behind the fabric, was appearing to strain the seams. The jacket he carefully folded and placed on the vanity bench, his boots against the wall, and his pants and stockings on top of them. He knelt down once more, rolling up his sleeves to the elbow. Richard flexed his fingers inside her, and she tried not to startle overmuch. She was warm from more than the water, though content to allow her cavaliers to direct the course of the evening. 

Nathaniel dipped his fingers into the water, trailing them up and then over the buoyant flesh of her breasts, pausing at a nipple.

“No milk yet?” he asked, curious. 

“None,” Georgiana confirmed.

“You are sure?” he asked, and when she nodded, he shrugged, and moved his hand to help lift one breast to breach the surface properly, though he could not fit the whole of it in his palm. Nathaniel lowered his head and took her nipple into his mouth and began to suck in the slow, rhythmic pulls that would have had her spurting into his mouth if she had anything to give. As it was, she had nothing, but the feeling still made her squirm, rubbing her legs together under the water hard enough to splash some over the side. She clenched tight around Richard’s fingers inside her, rewarded when he flexed them. When Nathaniel let her breast go and reached for the other one, the nipple was hard and rosy. Soon she was left squirming under his attention to the next, wishing that his tongue laving over it would reward him with more than her gasps. He gave it a kiss when he released it, and Georgiana sunk to her neck into the water, chest heaving, though the warm water on tender flesh did nothing to calm her.

Instead, she took stock of the room.

Stephan was helping Connor scrub his back, and James watched idly from his chair at the door, legs kicked out before him. He’d undone the front of his trousers to free his cock, and stroked it so lazily that there was not yet even the barest hint of his knot at the base.

“You will ruin your boots in the steam,” she said, closing her eyes. “And steam out all the starch in your collar.”

“Are you suggesting I strip?” he asked. Georgiana smiled. “That too.”

“Flatter my pride,” James said, “and at least watch.”

Drawn in by his compulsive argument, Georgiana opened her eyes and watched as he stood, coming to his full height. Nathaniel rested his forearms against the tub, water streaming down to ultimately pool on the floor, prisms of oil trapped in the droplets.

James unbuttoned his jacket slowly, top to bottom. He did not pull it off, instead doing the same for his vest, until she could see the linen of his shirt beneath. Undoing his neckcloth, he pulled at his collar until it fell open, offering her a glimpse of his chest, nut-brown from the sun. 

He bent to remove his boots, which gave her plenty of time to appreciate his thick thighs and fine calves, and he placed them against the wall as Nathaniel had done, draping his jacket over the vanity bench in the same careful manner. When he reached for the hem of his shirt, no doubt intending to forced her through the exquisite torture of watching up lift bit by bit to reveal more of his skin, Richard cut in.

“Hurry up,” he said, and James let the hem fall back down. 

“Why would I do that, and deprive our lady of the show?” 

“You don’t always need to be the center of attention,” Nathaniel said, very mildly. He was still leaning against the tub, and he lifted his head to look at James, his fingertips stirring the water. James stared back, still. Georgiana did not interrupt, drawing her knees to her chest. Her sodden hair was plastered to the back of her neck. Richard withdrew his fingers, and gave her ass a squeeze before he pulled his hand from the water.

It was James who relented, ducking his head with a smile and backing up. He removed his shirt, shucking it over his head, and stepped out of his trousers. He folded both and set them down with the boots, and then resumed his sentinel watch over the group from the chair. 

She considered a reprimand, but James had acquiesced so gracefully, and Nathaniel had been so gentle. They had the right to settle things among themselves, if they so wished.

Deciding to leave it be, she splashed her face with water, and set the soap and brush down by the side of the tub. Georgiana stood, and wrung out her hair, combing her fingers through it to coax out any knots from the scrubbing she’d given it. 

“Nathaniel,” she said, turning to look over her shoulder at him. “Would you like a bath?”

“No, lady,” he said. “I had one this morning.”

Then, to Richard. “Would you?”

He shook his head. “I also took one this morning.”

At her raised brow, he shrugged.

“It would be like you, to change your mind, and meet us here rather than in town.”

When she said nothing further, he went on.

“I know how you like us; clean and sweet,” Richard said. “And we all remember how you were this time with the last batch.”

“Oh?”

“Ravenous,” he confirmed, drawling out the word. “Enough to want it as soon as you were home. Or so I would have thought. A good homecoming.”

“You find your expectations unmet?”

“Not at all,” he said, very calmly. “You dropped to your knees for him,” he jerked his chin at Connor, “-in no time at all.”

She stepped out of the tub carefully, knowing the floor was slick. 

“Nathaniel,” she called. “Do you agree with Richard?”

“Yes,” he said, “But with one amendment.”

“Which is?”

“If he would call you hungry, I would name us starving.”

She could reach for a robe and dry herself off, move to the bedroom. 

“How evocative,” she said. Water dripped down her hair, ran in rivulets down her thighs. “What is it, to be starving?”

“To be willing to lay down here, if you would have me.”

She reached out, and stroked his hair. When she made to pull her hand away, he grabbed it, and held it so he could press his nose to her wrist. His eyes were closed. She did not need to look between his legs. As flowery as his words were, he would back them up. 

Speaking of.

“Lay down,” she said, to him. “I think at least the staff will like it; the laundress best of all.”

“As you command,” Nathaniel said, and grabbed for the folded petticoat she had knelt on while servicing Connor, and made use of it as a pillow as he laid back. Georgiana stood over him, then lowered herself onto his lap, running her palms appreciatively along his chest.

“I think,” she said, “I will have you in my cunt, and Richard in my ass,” with a glance to the man, and his nod and smile, “-and that will make a very fine homecoming.”

“I have no trouble with being so used,” Nathaniel said, and she laughed. Having taken Connor the night before, she was not concerned, pleased that when she squatted over him and began to take him inside her, her cunt swallowed him easily, his length fitting inside her with no troublesome wait. She did not possess patience for this any longer. 

On her knees and in his lap, she could rise and fall, controlling the pace and the force at which he drove into her. Nathaniel, who had no patience for fools and resented the rise of his inferiors while his status as a cavalier prevented him from achieving the same heights, was perfectly content to be ridden hard. Because he liked to watch, she slicked her fingers with her own spit and stroked her clit in time with the thrusts so he could have the pleasure of feeling her come around him and a front row seat to the way she trembled as she came.

“My turn,” Richard said breezily, once she had begun to recover. He knelt down next to them, his thick cock against his thigh, and Georgiana began to rise.

“No,” he said, still merry. “Keep him inside you, lay down.”

Georgiana blinked long-lashed eyes and did as she was asked. The sensation was like enough to being knotted, and she rested her head against Nathaniel’s chest, though her breasts and swelling belly made the position somewhat difficult. Nathaniel draped a hand over her waist and lifted his head to watch Richard at his work, while Georgiana sighed and closed her eyes.

Richard touched her first at the base of her spine, then dragged his fingers down again. This time, when he rubbed at her hole, it was with two oil-slick fingers. By the smell, she knew it to be the one she used for her hair, but it would work just as well for this. Nathaniel groaned when Richard’s probing fingers stroked along the skin separating them from his cock, and Georgiana too was affected, even if she lacked Nathaniel’s reaction. He moaned, head tipping back, throat working as he panted out his breaths. Georgiana merely lowered herself further, content to lay atop him, her breasts pillowed against his chest while Richard focused on her ass. It was so very nice to be attended to properly again, heady with the knowledge that once Nathaniel was sated, she could have another in his place, and the same for Richard, and so on. 

Richard poured more oil over his hand, his fingers pressed together into a tight bunch that rapidly bloomed to the width of his knuckles, and this he pushed into her and dragged out. All the while, he stroked Nathaniel too by proximity. She wondered if he intended to make use of his whole fist instead of his cock, and shivered in anticipation. The idea apparently occurred to James as well.

“Fuck her properly,” he said from his chair, “or I will.”

“Richard,” Georgiana said, and glanced over her shoulder. She did not need to make a command of it.

He pulled out his hand slowly, and Georgiana pressed her mouth to Nathaniel’s shoulder, to muffle her noises and hide her expression. She and Annette did not speak of bedsport (it would have been too much now that Stephan, her brother, was Georgiana’s) but the question of if it was normal to want this much had occurred to her, along with another half-dozen of the sort that really could only be addressed properly with a peer.

As Richard shuffled over and moved into position, he held her hips with one hand and guided himself in with the other. The slide was slow, but he was both penetrating her and dragging against Nathaniel as he seated himself inside her. Nathaniel, below her and breathing harder, certainly appreciated it.

“Work with me,” he reminded Richard, and some of their fingers overlapped where they held her hips.

The movement was like waves on the beach, rolling in slowly, Nathaniel and Richard united in the rhythm that allowed them to thrust into her in concert. The pace was not fast; she was not reduced to a mad sort of lust. Instead the sensations alone, the overwhelming press of two bodies, of being filled deeply enough, the heated press and slide of flesh reduced her awareness to only her immediate surroundings.

Nathaniel broke first. He grabbed her hips and held her still, letting the knot swell inside her, not determined to fuck her onto it. Richard took a different approach, thrusting while his knot formed, until he could not draw back out. His hand was not enough to prepare her for this stretch, and she whimpered, tucking her face against Nathaniel’s neck. He was too lost in bliss to notice, panting. Richard’s knot swelled in the little space left, a tight fit. He was not loud, but with his mouth so close to her ear, she could hear every noise he swallowed.

They came hard, filling her, Richard’s seed pushing deep into her gut. Nathaniel regained enough of himself to cup her cheek and kiss her. His beard rasped against her cheeks, smelling of the oils he used. She would smell of their scents, their come deep inside her. What was the perfume on top of that?

Embolden, she shook away his hand, broke the kiss, and bit and sucked a mark into his next, broken blood vessels coloring the skin. He certainly felt it, gasping, an instinctual jerk away from her teeth, but he was too knot-addled to protest much, and Richard only laughed.

“Mine,” she said, apologizing with a kiss. “And it will be below your collar.”

Nathaniel sighed.

“A love token would have suited just as well.”

She nuzzled at his neck instead.

They had a few minutes more of quiet recovery for the men before they began to get tired of holding the position. Richard pulled free, his knot tugging at her rim, and Georgina winced when he freed himself. Nathaniel soothed her with a kiss to the cheek, and she rolled off him, his soft cock offering no resistance. With her knees tucked under her, and her head pressed to the petticoat that had served as Nathaniel’s pillow, she took a moment to breathe. She was not satisfied. All they had done was wind her tighter.

From behind her, she heard the wood legs of the chair scrape against tile.

“So,” James said, standing, “My turn.”

“And mine,” Stephan piped up.

Of the two of them, James had the higher right to choose, and Georgiana obliged him easily and with a smile. She rolled over onto her hands and knees, ass up, her hole and cunt on full display, presenting for him. Her hole was open still from Richard’s use, bud-pink and ripe. He’d come deep enough inside of her that she was not yet leaking, but when he’d drawn out, he’d left his seed smeared along her ass and around the rim, along with the faint gleam of oil. It was Nathaniel’s come that oozed from her cunt, flushed and wet. Under James’ watchful eye, a thick glob fell to splat on the tiled floor. In this position, her belly nearly touched the ground, while her breasts rested on the cool tile, erect nipples made harder by the chill. 

“Cunny,” he said, and she saw his feet slap along the wet tile by her side in her limited view. He helped her up into kneeling. Her belly and breasts were getting to large for this sort of behavior, though she hated the idea of not being able to fuck as she wished where she wished, restricting this sort of activity to a bed was better sooner rather than later. 

James took Nathaniel’s position and towel without complaint, helping Georgiana ease her leg over his chest. She was too high, and almost protested, but Stephan scurried over and dropped down beside them, reaching for Georgiana. James’ dreamy focus snapped from bliss to rage in a moment, and he growled at Stephan, teeth bared, sitting up and wrapping an arm around Georgiana’s waist as she began to fall back.

“Wait for an invitation,” chided Richard. Georgiana did not bother to turn and look back at him or see what Stephan did in response, for James was lying back down and pressing her forward by the means of the hand he kept on the small of her back. She understood his meaning once he slipped his arm under her thigh and she was left straddling his face. His tongue was swiping up her cunt before she could ask it of him, his fine, full lips around the bud of her clit. She came on that alone, head thrown back in a soundless gasp, and she could have struck him, for he laughed and it vibrated through her, deep and rich and an addition to her torment. With no cock inside her, no knot to seize, her cunt clenched on nothing, and more of Nathaniel’s come was squeezed out of her, to splatter onto James’ face. Impudent devil that he was, he licked her and his lips too, and snaked his arm out from under her. Weak-kneed but understanding, and in a mood to be indulgent, she slid back to sit on his hips. He held himself steady as she sank down on him in one fluid motion, impaling herself on his shaft. Georgiana leaned in for a kiss and he gave her one flavored with her own cunt and Nathaniel’s seed. His hand stroked along her spine, and she felt perfectly, absolutely content.

When she broke it, she relaxed to lay against his chest as best she could. He kept an arm wrapped around her. 

“Stephan,” he said. “Come here.”

By the smacking sound of wet feet, Stephan obliged. 

“Go on.”

Stephan sat himself behind them, grabbed her hips, and thrust in easily. He plowed through in the wake of Richard’s cock, way slicked by Richard’s come, her ass as wet with it as her cunt was by arousal. He fucked her with the overeager driving thrusts of youth, none of the restraint that defined her other cavaliers. Under her, James’ breathing became erratic, but he made no attempt to fuck her in concert or to allow her the freedom to move and please both of them as she had pleased Nathaniel and Richard. Instead, he swiped his tongue along her cheek. Surprised, she turned her head and he caught her lips to kiss her, tongue thrusting into her mouth. 

Stephan continued to plow into her, chasing his pleasure, but Georgiana was wound in James’ presence. He cupped the back of her head with one large hand, his fingers buried in damp curls. When he broke the kiss, she pressed her face into his neck, inhaling his scent greedily. Stephan began to swell, stumbling through the breakneck pace of his thrusts, and Georgiana sighed when he finally caught, unable to continue, and began to come. 

Under her, James shivered. Georgiana nuzzled at his neck and then lifted her head so she could look down at his face. Stephan had curiously not fallen on top of her, and so she was able to rise, her hands on the tile on either side of James’ head, her back an arch. She felt something shift inside her, and then squirmed, realizing how well caught she was. 

“Fucking tight,” he gasped, and Georgiana realized that with Stephan’s knot pushing down on him from her inside, she must have been a vice around him. She laughed, rocking forward, and James cursed again, red blooming over his cheeks. “Going to fucking kill me.”

“You planned this?” she asked, and he grinned, the expression wiped as he moaned, his hands leaving her hair and her back for her hips, all the better to drive her down harder on the short little rocking thrusts she could manage, so trapped by Stephan. Still, he was enjoying it, all bared teeth and grows, and Georgiana loved the sensation of being overfull. Her breasts bounced as she worked her hips, reminding her of their weight, the haft of the flesh leaving them swinging in low, wobbling arcs as she fucked herself on James’ cock. 

With each thrust, his fat head pounded against the walls of her cunt, the sensation heightened by the knot still in her ass, still inflamed and bulbous inside her. James tightened his hold and began to pull her down harder, and she moaned, head back, as he imposed a more rigid rhythm. Stephan, dazed, made a noise of complaint, but it was drowned out by Georgiana’s whine as she came. Her cunt, split wide, could not entirely clench harder on either of them, but the sensation ran through her body, an inferno that burned hottest in her belly then echoed through her limbs. 

“You want it?” he asked, and Georgiana, all softness in the aftermath of yet another orgasm, managed only a gasp of his name. His knot was swelling, but she had been fucked thoroughly by Nathaniel, and was soaked with his come and her own arousal. It did not catch, and continued to grow. By now, he was doing the majority of the work, guiding her with the hands on her hips. Half delirious with the pleasure, she was not sure what noises she was making, only that they were desperate little sounds, half wails and clear encouragement for the beast below her.

Georgiana braced a hand against his chest. He pulled her onto him, his knot pushing inside her, and pulled it out, her cunt wide and flush and gaping, to take it on the next thrust, and again, and again, as Stephan tried to follow and keep up, still tied, bouncing more than Georgiana. James forced the knot into her once more, and when he tried to pull out, Georgiana hissed and clawed at his chest. 

“Please,” she said, and James thrust a second time to seat it more fully inside her. Georgiana cried out, coming again, the sensations muted in their intensity from so much repeated abuse. Stephan exclaimed too close to her ear and she fell forward onto James’ chest, feeling it strain with effort as he breathed.

“Fuck,” Stephan gasped. “Fuck, fuck, James,” and he squeaked, a teakettle boiling. Inside her, Georgiana could feel his cock twitch as he came again, his knot swelling back to previous proportions. James moaned, low, like a bull bellowing, her legs split wide by his shaft. His knot felt massive, and she was unsure if it was due to his arousal or to the lack of space inside her, but when he managed his final hard thrust, there was a moment where she was concerned it would not fit inside her, but he jerked her down onto it. It did, swollen enough to feel like he’d forced a melon inside her, and then he came.

She remembered her heats only hazily, mostly impressions of moments, snatches of conversations, the moments between the peaks of need. James’ face, eyes unfocused and wild, mouth open, nostrils flared, sparked a deep recognition in her. The cording on his neck stood out, all the strain in his body visible, but still some fragment of memory remained, for he held her still as he spurted into her, his back arched off the floor, rope after rope of thick come hot in her cunt, his training still remembered. His hold relaxed as the torrent slowed, then stopped. He sagged back, panting, and his eyes gradually refocused on the ceiling above them. Behind her, Stephan was similarly wrecked, though he made no movement or suggestion. 

James’ chest rose and fell, and Georgiana with it, lulled into calm. She could not imagine moving, and so when Connor and Richard picked their way over a few minutes later, she did not react at all.

“Well,” Richard said, and Connor grunted in agreement. 

Stephan’s weight came off her, with the only protest a mumbled curse as his knot was pulled free. Georgina felt the seed spill out and over her puffy rim and squirmed. That, James reacted to, immediately alert. He attempted to push himself up on his elbow but couldn’t manage it, falling back down with a dull thump. Georgiana, naturally, came with him, glad it had not been the crack of skull striking file.

“Very impressive,” Nathaniel said, from what had formerly been James’ seat.

“Thank you,” James said. It took him a moment more to come up with the breath for the next question. He kissed Georgiana’s forehead, and she tilted her face to look at him. His brow was wrinkled, and he was frowning. “Are you alright, love?”

“Mhm,” she affirmed. She bumped her nose against the underside of his jaw, inhaling. His anxiety faded and hsi heartbeat slowed, but he still did not let her go. 

“Did you want to come again?” he asked, and she shook her head. She probably couldn’t manage it even if he used his mouth again. She was oversensitive in a way that spoke of pain more than pleasure from any further tender touches. “Connor,” James said, and she was unsurprised when he let her go, and Connor’s hands took her by the waist and shoulder and helped her into a sitting position. James’ knot had not gone down entirely, but she was still able to free herself, fucked well and open, if not without winces all around.

Her knees were weak, but Connor held her. A yelp from across the room revealed Richard pouring a pitcher over Stephan to clean him off, the water sluicing off his body and across the floor to the drain, cleaning the mess on the floor as it went. Nathaniel and James’ come slid down her thighs, her cunt now uncorked, but Connor was far more gentle with her, wiping between her legs with a cloth to carry off the worst of it before helping her back into the tub for a quick rinse. It was silly to be sad at the loss, to feel empty. They’d given her, as Annette had pointed out the night before, a probably dozen who would be with her for the next several months at least. Now was not the time for melancholy.

Out of the water, Nathaniel had a robe for her, similar to the one he now sported, and helped her rub down her hair. She leaned on him a great deal, and when he was done, he settled for picking her up. Over her shoulder, she saw Connor had gone to help a cleaned-up James back into his shirtsleeves and trousers, playing the valet. Richard was doing the same with Stephan, but his charge seemed mostly boneless. She lost the view as Nathaniel carried her out and back into the bedroom, towards her bed.

Georgiana sighed as Nathaniel set her down gently, curling up. She was bone tired and ultimately satisfied in a way that bode well for her sleep tonight. Nathaniel drew up the covers, and she let the pillow carry the weight of her head and neck. 

Stephan stumbled out of the bathroom, the apparent source of his clumsiness his difficulties with his trousers; it was Richard who stepped in and helped him pull them up and button them, slapping away the other cavalier’s interference and drunken protestations. 

“Bed for you, I think,” Richard muttered, and laid his hand on Stephan’s shoulder, all the better to encourage him out of the room and hopefully up the stairs to his own chamber. One of the maids brought in a tray through the same open door, and Connor took it from her, closing the door pointedly once she was gone.

The smell of hot food awoke Georgiana’s hunger despite her tiredness, and she sat up eagerly, back to the pillows. James carried the bench over from the window, and he and Nathaniel sat on that while Connor brought back the chair from the bathroom. The tray was set on the bed, and after pointedly watching while Connor took a roll from the basket and had a bite, Georgiana helped herself to one as well, smearing on butter just to see it melt.

“You leave tomorrow.” It was as good as a place to start as any. Then, to force them to speak, she took a bite. The hot bread was heavenly. 

Connor, similarly occupied, glanced to Nathaniel, and then to the door.

“No, we aren’t waiting for Richard. And there are some things which we cannot discuss with Stephan.” He frowned. “He’s young, and thinks too much of glory. He’ll also be around a rough sort. I won’t give himself the ammunition to shoot himself in the foot.”

By now, Georgiana had swallowed. She set the bread down and reached for the knife and fork; all the better to cut the roast.

“You have doubts?”

James looked at her. His jaw was tight. “Yes.”

“About the war? About the command?” she pressed.

James looked away. Nathaniel looked from him to Georgiana, then to the floor. 

She set down her silverware. “Are you planning anything?”

“To come home to you when it is done,” Nathaniel said. 

Georgiana did not look away. She would not yield to him in this, for she knew full well the consequences for the kind of behavior they were alluding to. So did they, far better than she, Nathaniel and James both more than a decade her senior and roaming unattached for years before she’d taken them.

Her rising anger make them all uncomfortable, Connor leaving his post by the door to come to her, walking a wide arc around the other men. He came to the side of the bed and knelt clumsily, but she recognized the position for submission. Georgiana dropped her hand without thought, her response automatic. He scented at her wrist, and his breath was hot on her skin. Some of the anger melted away like sugar in water. 

James took advantage.

“We aren’t planning anything,” he said. “We have a lot to live for. We aren’t glory-addled boys anymore.”

“Like Stephan,” she said.

“Like Stephan,” he agreed. Nathaniel finally raised his head. Had she been harsher than she meant? She had not meant to be harsh at all, so the answer was surely a yes. She went to take up the knife and fork again, taking her hand back from Connor, but the meat turned her stomach. She pushed the dish back on the tray.

“Stay the night,” she said. “I will see you off formally in the morning, but you may stay here tonight.”

“Going soft?” James asked, standing. He went for the tray, and Georgiana batted his hand away, taking the best of the meat she’d already cut and offering it to him, cupping her hand below the tines of the fork to catch the droppings. He took it, eyes on her the entire time.

“You need to eat,” Nathaniel said, but did not leave his chair.

“Allow me my indulgences,” she chided. “As you have said, you may be gone a long while.”

“It’s not his command,” James said, swallowing. “It’s that we’re fighting at all. Moncrieff's glory is the only thing to be won in this.”

“Which means there will be some for you to take as well,” Connor said. “Advancement. It is why you fight for someone other than your lady at all.”

“For someone not raised to it, you certainly have knowledge of our code,” James remarked, and reached for another slice with his fingers. Georgiana allowed it. “And Georgiana doesn’t need that, does she? No. We’ll behave honorably and come home right quick, and keep our complaints to ourselves. Let Moncrieff have his glory and all the laurels the senate can bestow on him. I have something better.”

Georgiana nearly portioned some of the meal onto the plate that had once held the bread, and offered it to Nathaniel. “Do you?”

“Oh, yes,” James said. “A great big cock and a satisfied lady as proof it works.”

Nathaniel began to choke on his first bite, thumped himself on the chest, and coughed. “Really, James?”

James grinned. 

“Don’t tell me that doesn’t keep him up at night. All that power and no legacy. You’ve met the wife, Georgiana, do you think it’s her fault?”

Georgiana took a bite and considered while she chewed. James’ bad behavior aside, it was an interesting bit of gossip to turn over.

“No,” she said. “He’s further from creche lines. And mama said–“

“‘– breeding tells’”, yes, we know,” James said, but there was no malice. Nathaniel gave him a look anyway.

“I am not from creche lines,” Connor pointed out, very reasonably. “Neither is Richard.”

“It happens from time to time,” James said breezily. “Good to have a little new blood.”

Nathaniel broke in, “And I feel as well as could be felt leaving the two of you with her while we’re gone.”

“Still,” James said, sneaking yet more food from her plate. “Best to be home as soon as we can. We’ll likely miss the birth,” and at this he grimaced, “but we cannot have it said that the house of Devereux does not do their duty.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone is curious, while James is the theoretically dominant cavalier, due to having been the one to contract with Georgiana first and from a reputable family, Nathaniel and Richard are his seniors. Next oldest after James is Connor, then comes Stephan, who is actually younger than Georgiana by a year or two.
> 
> Next chapter: Georgiana and James' first meeting, several years previously.


	3. Claim

There was no more elegant way to say it than that James had been given to her like someone could be gifted a horse or a hunting dog. When she was seventeen and near presenting, the lady at the nearest estate, Lady Beldon, an especial friend of her mama, had called home all her unattached cavalier sons, a respectable dozen born into the creche during her time whittled down to six.

Mama had emphasized that the first was always the most important. She would draw others- seven or eight if she was lucky- but the first always set the tone and needed to set down the law until the natural pecking order worked itself out between the cavaliers. It needn’t be an especially strong bond, given the scant options, but there needed to be true compatibility for the best possible chance of felicity among the household.

Lady Beldon had sent every son she could into service, and so four of the six were on leave and available for Georgiana's inspection. They were all handsome enough in their uniforms, all dark-haired like their mother, even as variations in their bearing and appearances indicated their differing sires. They were further alike in how they stared out, somewhere over her head, even as she broke away from the older women for a better look, slowly starting down the line.

The militant posture was not what had pulled her into a stop before the first son, nor was it the breadth of his shoulders or the expression on his face. In fact, he had not looked flattered at all when she had paused, more annoyed than delighted by the attention. 

“My eldest,” Lady Beldon had said. “James.”

“Will it be him, Georgiana?” her mother had asked, and she did not reply by speaking, only jerked her head in a quick little nod, reduced to idiotic stupor. It was not his shoulders, or the uniform, but there was still something about him that captivated her. Never mind that she had not walked by the others for a true comparison. She was mesmerized. 

“Did you have a date in mind?” Lady Beldon asked her mother.

“Oh,” her mother said, “sometime before the end of the year. But she will need to debut, first, and make friends. I was considering my late aunt’s estate for her. We would need to reopen it, of course, but the local town and families have been dependent on a lady two day’s travel away for their children, and rumor has it that she is zealously hoarding them, reluctant to let them go five miles from her gate.”

“That will end poorly,” Lady Beldon said darkly. “Our grandmothers lived through the Rising; has she forgotten that lesson already?”

Her mother replied tersely, but Georgiana was trying to recover some measure of intelligence, and tried to engage in a little light conversation. James’ brothers bore sour expressions and still did not look at her, but as they were not free to leave, they had nothing to do but keep their hands folded at their backs and look anywhere but her face.

“Hello,” she tried, for it was a good place to start.

He stared down at her, the only deviation from the pose his brothers held.

“My name is Georgiana Devereux,” she said, leaving out the name of her mother’s estate, for he surely knew.

Mama glanced over, and stopped talking to Lady Beldon.

“Don’t be shy,” she said, and Lady Beldon smiled. 

“Why don’t you take him to the garden, dear,” she suggested, and then gestured at James, who, jaw tight, offered her his arm. She took it, her hold light, but she could feel the solidity of him through the fabric of his jacket. The eyes of his brothers followed them as they left the rooms, their expressions growing more sullen and cross.

“Your mother’s house is very beautiful,” she tried, as they walked through the long, sunny corridors. She could see the greenhouse from the window, filled with all sorts of lovely growing things that pressed against the glass. Indoors, the rooms were filled with tasteful portraiture and pastoral scenes that were as cheery as the marble floors and gauzy curtains. “She is a fan of the classics? Or did your fathers have a hand in the design?”

“No,” he said.

It was then, despite her infatuation, that she considered returning to her mother, and perhaps asking for another. What good could a cavalier who did not have any affection for her, or even the good manners to fake it, do? They walked in silence a little longer, until the end of the hall where they could take the path to the garden.

The cobblestone path was very charming, though not deserving of the amount of attention she was giving it, and not her companion. She stepped neatly on the stones, and tried to ignore the heat of her companion’s emotions. If nothing else, this was a good test of her ability to handle being around an unbound cavalier.

“What do you want from me?” he asked, bluntly, as they crossed from the path into the garden proper, passing under an arch.

“A walk,” she said. “It is a very pretty garden.”

“Some entertainment, then,” he said, very dry.

“No,” she said, and frowned. “No, do not be silly. I am in search of,” she grasped for a word, “an anchor.”

He did not say anything, but glanced at her, his eyebrows raised. She felt horribly small and ignorant in comparison, shrinking from the force of his presence. Georgiana stared at the path in front of her. The herbs and such had given way to perennials and shrubbery, all of it very neat and orderly. It was a shame Lady Beldon didn’t have a daughter suitable to take over the estate after she passed. Maybe a niece or granddaughter would come along before then. After all, she was only mama’s senior by a handful of years. She had time. She decided to be honest, and as blunt as he. After all, he would surely gossip with his brothers. Perhaps one would be of a better disposition. 

“Mama told me I had to be careful.”

“With me?” he asked.

“In general.”

“We all have to be careful,” he said. They passed by the edge of the hedge maze, he turned in, and she followed. “That’s how it is now.”

“You are out among them more than I am,” she admitted, and once more, he looked at her in a way that made her feel small.

“Your mother keeps you secluded?” he asked. “With all their chatter, I would have thought you would see your tenants and dependents often.”

“I do!” Georgiana said immediately, rushing to her own defense. “But they don’t count, not really. I have never been to town, nor have I stayed the night anywhere other than at Annette’s mother’s estate,” and at his blank look, she said, “Lady Symington,” and some flicker of recognition smoothed his expression.

“So you are an unblemished flower, sheltered from the whole of the world and society besides,” he said, and she sputtered, momentarily too incised to offer a retort. Like a wave receding from shore, all hope of bettering the course of the conversation, or at least making it more productive, was pulled from her. 

“I am sorry for whatever offense I gave,” she said. “We can go back to the house.”

Though she was sure neither lady would be displeased with her, and would surely allow her to try and see if a more sanguine match could be made with another brother, Georgiana was hesitant. Mama had been so confident; Georgiana was loath to disappoint her. 

“A few minutes more,” James said, and took the right when they were presented with a fork in the maze. “Then Cecil may have his time with you, then all the rest.”

Georgiana stared at the grass underfoot. “I do not think- I do not think your brother wants to walk with me,” and she felt confident in casting so wide an assumption on Cecil’s feelings, given the looks they had all been wearing.

“Don’t be foolish,” James said, and they passed a little alcove with a bench where a statue stood, plainly a cavalier and continuing in the classical theme of the house. James’ eyes glazed over it like it was a continuation of the hedges, but Georgiana lingered, if somewhat in shock at the lifelike depiction. “He was about to tear my head off.”

“For what?” she asked, still stuck on the anatomical details of the statue, but forced by necessity to tear her eyes away and, cheeks burning, return to her observations of the grass. 

“For getting the first chance with you.” She moved her hand where it rested on his arm, thoughtless, and he jerked it as if she had dug her claws in. Both of them stopped. She had to look up at him while they spoke, lest she seem dimwitted.

“I doubt he’s ever been around an unattached lady before,” he continued, still dry. “Our mother makes sure of that. Hell, she’s cautious about having us around her friends. George and Arthur died without a whiff of one, I’m sure.”

She supposed these were the sons that had gone into service and been lost. “I’m sorry,” she said.

James scoffed.

“Honorable deaths,” he said. “And I’m sure they were glad of it, given the likelihood of finding a lady. It bothers mother endlessly that none of her sons have a placement yet. I’ll tell her about your Annette. That might cheer her up.”

“Do you not want one?” she asked.

“What?” James said, “a placement?”

He stared at her, before continuing. “What lady would offer me one? I’m happy enough. I’ve a life. A good position on a well-run ship.” 

“I do not mean to ask you to give it up,” she started, slow to speak. She knew very little about him. She could not shape her argument to appeal to him. 

“You would offer for me?” He looked down at her, puzzled, but momentarily silenced.

She nodded, hands held loosely before her. That was what she was here for, and if he had no great objection to it or dislike of her, then what was there in saying no?

“You would offer for me, without speaking with any of my brothers, knowing my mother whelped no ladies, and you’ve no demands I give up my commission?”

Georgiana nodded again. 

James cursed, and she took a step back, thigh hitting the bench. She sat.

“No,” he said, “don’t- but why?”

She was honest: “I need a cavalier who knows the etiquette, who has been well-trained, who will be reliable and steadfast, and who will teach any sons I bear to be the same. And,” she said, faltering here, “you smell good.” 

Mama had placed much stock by that, if less than breeding and upbringing.

He did still smell delicious, even angry, and her reply startled him enough that he did not reply at all.

“May I scent you?” she asked, as polite as she could make it in her eagerness.

Wary, he watched her, and then he went to his knees in the grass before the bench, palms flat on his thighs. Here were his good manners on display, his old manners. She had to lean forward to do it, and she was very careful to mind herself about it, to inhale near where neck met jaw, where his collar stopped and she could see skin. He shuddered as she came in close, but otherwise did not move nor attempt to return the gesture. He was still alluring; whatever about him that had caught her attention in his presence and smell still had a hold on her now, and she relaxed back into her seat, hands in her lap.

“I would offer for you,” she said, more firmly this time. “I will ask your mother for permission, and you could be mine as soon as mama says it is acceptable to have the paperwork dome.”

He slid forward over the damp grass, staring up at her.

“I never thought... “ he started. “I never thought I’d be chosen.”

He sounded puzzled, but at least he wasn’t so stern, so she reached out to touch him, and at her hand, he melted, his cheek in her palm. She coaxed him forward a little more, and he went forward, still on his knees, until his head lay in her lap and she could stroke his hair, the picture of good submission, even if there was still a stiffness to him.

“Why?” she repeated. “You are very handsome, and your mother is very clever and well-mannered. Mama said so.”

“There aren’t many like you left,” he said, eyes closed. “Ladies, or estates and creches. People want to do things the new way, since the Rising.”

“Mama says it isn’t sustainable,” she pointed out, very reasonably. “It always stops working so well after a few generations. Then they’ll realize they need us, and-”

“Thank you? No. They’ll be discontent again,” James cut in, lifting his head. “And that’ll lead nowhere but more fucking bloodshed.”

He realized he had misspoken, and pulled away from her hand.

“My apologies,” he said gruffly, but Georgiana shook her head. She did not want him to be upset. 

“Please sit by me.”

He rose, stepped back, hesitated, looking at the hedges. Then James ran his hand over his head, scoffed, and then sat down next to her. He really did smell nice. Without much preamble, she tucked her legs under her, and leaned her head on his shoulder. He stiffened, but did not shrug her off. Emboldened, she took hold of his hand, interlacing her fingers with his, drawn by his warmth.

“Do you really think so?” she asked.

James stayed stiff and silent for so long she thought he would refuse to answer her, but eventually, he sighed, and stared down at their hands intertwined.

“Yes,” he said. “I do. I’ve fought beside so many men, cavalier and not, and all the mundane ones have all sorts of ideas about us until they get to know us, and even then, they’ve still got their suspicions. Even the creche-born ones. The ones that live near the estates are the best sort, but there aren’t many. And that’s what they think of the cavaliers. Most of them won’t ever meet a lady. People don’t like knowing about where they came from; don’t like thinking about it.”

She had found a small scar on his hand and rubbed at it with her thumb, like she would a spot of dirt.

“Would they think better of us if they saw us more?” she asked. “Saw what sort of people that we are, our manners, knew our names.”

He really smelled divine. She wanted to squirm into his lap, rub herself all over him, get her own scent on his clothes and skin. Mama might allow it, as long as it did not go too far. She had things to do before she could establish a creche of her own, and one of them was to acquire new cavaliers, or draw them to her. She could not do that if she was all wrapped up in just one, or, worse, sent one of them into rut or heat.

James waited another long moment before he spoke again.

“Maybe,” he said. “I’m not sure. It’s only been a decade since they started allowing us any sort of command. Mother worked hard at that. Sent so many of us into the Navy that they ought to be sending her the medals. They do for the ones that die, at least.”

“Then we’ll follow her tactics, though I would prefer not to lose so many,” she said, and James stared at her. She shrugged, and brought his hand to her mouth, kissing where their fingers joined. “Mama wants me introduced in town; she has so many friends! Then I shall have friends, and perhaps that will stop people from being discontent when they realize they need us again, and I suppose it shall also help your career, which I find myself caring very much about.”

“Do you?” he said, very droll, his wit dry in a way she found she liked very much, even as she knew he doubted her.

“Yes,” she said, “as you are mine.”

Something dark bloomed in his eyes, and he shifted to better face her on the bench.

“Am I?” he said, and she nodded, swept by a sudden wave of heat. She tipped her head to the side so he could press his mouth to her bare neck and inhale, though he did not bite. She felt the shiver run through him, aware now of how much larger he was than her, that he might press her to the bench and loom over her. She would like that.

“Mine,” she confirmed, and his inhale was shaky, but he did not pull away.

“I want,” he said, and she hummed before replying, “What do you want?”

“I want to be inside you,” he said. “I want to knot you, I want-- I want someone made to fuck me and want it.”

“You’ve knotted someone else?” she asked, and tried to mind her tone.

“Yes,” he admitted, twisted and ashamed, and the words fell from him as a rush even as he continued to nose at her neck. “It feels so good, and they say they want it, that they can handle it. Some of them- some of them make a habit of it, they’ll take it and won’t scream or try to squirm away, but it’s not the same, it can’t be the same.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s not…” He swallowed thickly, and she let go of his hand to stroke his hair again, the other tossed around his shoulders. There was moisture where his cheek rested against her shoulder. “I can’t…”

“What?” she asked again. 

“Can’t breed them,” he said, miserable. “It’s empty. Wasted seed. It’s not enough, and then I just want to keep fucking, keep fighting, like that’ll make it stop. I fight through my ruts, it’s how they make us get through them in the service, but all I can keep thinking is that I should push them down and fuck them instead.”

He was breathing harder, and she kept stroking his hair. She murmured nonsense, letting him work himself through it, though he never broke into actual sobs. The self-hatred ran deep, with no source beyond whatever he’d been exposed to combining with his own as-yet unfulfilled needs. When he gathered himself somewhat, she spoke again.

“I want to see it,” she said, and he flinched, pulling back and out of her hold.

“Me fucking some-” he started, spitting out every word and she cut him off, shaking her head.

“No,” Georgiana said. “Your cock. I want to see it.”

“Why?” he asked, suspicious. 

That wasn’t no, so she forged on. They had the damned statue hanging over them, which was a poetic sort of backdrop, at least.

“You are mine, and I heard mama, she doesn’t think it’s sensible to start for at least a year, and we won’t be alone for months yet, and I want to see it.”

To punctuate this, she reached for him, her hand cupping where he rested against his own thigh, so painfully obvious through his trousers that it had been difficult to resist focusing on it and not his face before they had begun talking about the things that disquieted him and what she intended to do about it.

“You’re very large,” she said, by way of comment. He flushed, startled. “You can’t knot me, not yet, and I am sorry for that, I am, but I want to see you very badly. Will you let me?”

James stared at her for a moment more, then stood, undoing his trousers, his vest, pulling his coat out of the way. He hesitated when it came time to untuck his shirt, glancing at her, but she only stared back placidly, patient.   
  
“You’re a demon in human form,” he said. The red blotches were fading from his cheeks.

Finally, he pulled the linen out of the way, and pulled himself free, dangling freely between his legs.

He was perhaps the length of her wrist to her forearm, and about as wide around, if better proportioned. Further and more accurate examination would necessitate use of a measuring tape, which she did not carry on her person. Nor did the particulars really matter. She was mostly focused on having a live specimen on which she could practice. 

“Will you step closer?” she asked, and he did, impaired a bit by his trousers bunched around his thighs. Now, she could reach out and touch him with a reverent sort of curiosity. 

He was not hard, but warm to the touch. The skin was like that of her own inner thigh, smooth and thin. Georgiana liked how he flinched then exhaled all at once when she gave a gentle squeeze. He was thicker at the base, though not by much, the bulb of his knot as interested as the rest of him, which was to say increasingly so. 

“Closer,” she said, and he shuffled forward. Now, he was hardening, arousal making him swell. Her fingers could still circle him, and she held him like that until his girth forced them apart. Georgiana let him go, and watched as his cock bobbed. 

“What makes you feel good?” she asked, and he laughed, short and breathy.

“I should be asking you that.”

“Really,” she said, and reached out to grab a handful of his shirt, pulling him closer. 

“You’ve lovely, soft hands,” he said, and she smiled, turning her head, for he had paid her a compliment.   
She took hold of him again, the circle of her fingers dragging from shaft to tip, his foreskin dragged back to reveal the red, drooling head. Interest piqued, she dipped her head to lap it up, her first taste of seed salty and stinging. James cursed again, and she tipped her head up to look at him. 

“It doesn’t feel good?” she asked.

“Aye, it feels good,” he said. When she waited for him to continue, he exhaled and took her hand, closing it around the bulb of his knot at the base of his cock.

“Here,” he said, “and the head, and all of it.”

“These?” she asked, impulsively reaching for his balls, letting them rest in her palm.

“And those,” he admitted. 

“They’re large,” she said.

“Have to be, to give you what you’ll start wanting in a few years.”

She made a noise of agreement, and went back to his cock. The knot in particular interested her. With her thumb rubbing the head, she could kiss along the knot, feeling how hot the flesh was under her tongue. She felt no fear, only a buzzing sort of anticipation low in her belly. 

“What happens, when someone won’t let you knot?” she asked.

“I don’t.” 

“To you, I mean,” she said. James exhaled. She gave him an encouraging squeeze. He was still dripping, pearly beads of precome falling from the head like honey dripping from the comb. 

“It hurts,” he said, “until the swelling goes down, but it’s miserable all the while.”

She looked at it, unable to imagine it as the source of so much trouble.

“How large does it get?”

“Very large,” James said grimly. His tone ignored, she allowed herself to imagine it, the feeling of being that full, tied so intimately. She squeezed her thighs together, and her cunt clenched on nothing.

When she looked up, James was looking down at her with a frown.

“Is something wrong?” she asked. His cock was shiny with her saliva, and Georgiana wiped her lips with her fingers to rid herself of any unflattering spittle. 

“No, love,” he said. He grinned, and there was no malice in it, just shared conspiracy. “But if you mean to flout convention, why not make it worth it for you too?”

“I’m not sure I understand,” she began, but he knelt down again before her, and rested his hand on her stocking-covered ankle. When his hand began a lascivious course up her thigh, she knew, and inhaled and looked away.

“I can smell you,” James said, all in a low purr. “Let me taste that sweet cunny. Come forward, sit on the edge of the bench.”

He peeled her skirts and petticoats alike up, until they were bunched up in her lap. Her shift he pushed aside too, and then he knelt between her legs, bending to kiss at the cleft between her legs. The rumble in his throat as he nuzzled her apart was deep and low. 

“So wet,” he said, “Just from touching me?”

“From thinking of you inside me,” she admitted. “From thinking of how it will feel to be knotted.”

“Brave girl,” he said, and she grabbed his hair, pushing his face against her cunt. He laughed, and the vibrations sent shivers through her. 

Georgiana let him go so he could slide two fingers inside her, but she kept her hand in his hair while he licked her, kissing and sucking her clit while letting his fingers thrust inside her, dual sensations of pleasure. He muttered sweet nothings too, and all the while, he used his other hand to jerk himself off, letting his fingers match the tempo that he used when thrusting into his own fist. It was not taking him by any means, but it was something.

Only when he began to pant did she realize he intended to make himself come too, and she was startled enough to pull him away from her cunt. With his face smeared with fluid and his pupils blown wide, his hair escaped from his queue, he was a different man.

“Won’t it- James, it will hurt, please don’t!”

He jerked out of her hold, and reapplied himself to his task.

“Don’t care,” he mumbled against her cunt. He suckled her clit, tongue dragging down her bud while his fingers curled tight, pleasuring her from the inside and out. Georgiana wailed, but caught it in her mouth, grit teeth, her hands tightening in his hair as she came. It was all she had ever wanted, the burst of delight echoing through her whole body, centered in her cunt, clenching tight around James’ fingers and gasping his name, and she wanted more. 

“Georgiana, Georgiana, _please_ ,” James mumbled, and she stroked his hair while he fucked his fist harder. She only had to glance between his legs to see the knot, swollen and an angry red-purple, but James kept stroking, and he came a moment later. The veins in his face stood out as he cried out, his seed shooting onto the grass below the bench in thick, white ropes. He released himself only to stuff his fingers in his mouth to stifle his pained cries.

She saw his knot once more as she tumbled off the bench to kneel next to him; it was an ugly color, like a bruise, misshapen, no longer the exotic and mouthwatering delight she had so enjoyed playing with only minutes ago. James was rocking back and forth, eyes glazed, fingers still caught between his teeth to stifle the pained noises. 

Georgiana held his face between her hands, trying not to panic. He had said it would be painful, but he had done it anyway, and now he was suffering. 

“Oh, James,” she said, and tried to soothe him. She stroked his hair, kissed his cheek, and, seized in a moment of panic, yanked the collar of his shirt down and out of the way so she could scent at his neck. She bit down before she knew what she intended, and her teeth broke the skin, the sharp taste of coppery blood flooding her mouth. James jerked under her, then stilled. She released him, pulling back, licking the wound to stop the bleeding. He had, at least, stopped shaking.

His eyes were open, if clouded with pain, and he reached out to touch her lips. She stayed very still while he swept his thumb over her bottom lip. It came back tacky with his blood.

“Worth it,” he breathed, and he dipped his head to nuzzle against her neck, inhaling her scent. She stroked his back. Slowly, he recovered, but he was groggy and loose-limbed, which meant she was free to crawl into his lap and kiss him silly, glad to see him well. Better still, he licked his seed from her fingers very sloppily, tongue delving into the spaced between her fingers, suckling on them, with the same enthusiasm he had when licking her cunt. He was softer, relaxed, and kept scenting her, licking at the curve of her neck. She did not try to stop him. She did not try to make him do anything at all, letting him have his fill of her and soaking him in all the same. It was only when she heard faint chatter that she took action. He was slow, but she helped him tuck himself back inside his trousers and right his shirt and vest and jacket, checking the bite to make sure it was not bleeding, taking one more kiss before she rose to her feet and waited for their mothers to make their appearance. 

They were mostly presentable when Mama and Lady Beldon stepped into the alcove, though James was still holding her hand, and the scents in the air told a story all their own.

Lady Beldon laughed, but Mama only smiled.

“You are happy with your choice, my dear?”

Georgiana stood, and James was slow to let her go, sitting up to keep their fingers interlocked for a few moments more.

“Yes, mama. I am.”

She did not catch what Lady Beldon said to James as she joined her mother to walk back up the path to the great house, only that her tone seemed amused, and perhaps even relieved, but that might well have been Georgiana’s imagination alone. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter: While the house is empty with James, Nathaniel, and Stephan off to war, Georgiana receives a great deal of news.


	4. Inheritance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting up several things for later chapters and the main conflict in this one. 👀

She did not wake so much as realize the sun was rising and the maid who was not Anne would be in to dress her soon. This restless night and all the preceding ones could not be blamed on her condition. It was instead general unease that she blamed. No amount of Connor and Richard’s company would soothe her, but time would make her accustomed to it.

With her newfound resolution found, she rose, just in time for the entrance of the maid. 

“Something warm,” Georgiana said, followed by, “What is your name?”

“Martha,” the girl said, and Georgiana resigned herself more fully to a maid who was not Anne as she was helped into her short stays and then the cotton dress. Already, her breasts were nearly too large for the dress, the flesh at the neckline bulging, and her belly lifted the hem by several inches. There was a truck with the appropriate dresses somewhere in the house; she was sure Martha would find it and replace all her fine, elegant frocks with things more appropriate, billowing and shapeless.

Martha braided her hair and tucked it under a cap, and Georgia selected a mantle to wrap about her shoulders before dismissing her, as another maid came in with breakfast. 

Winter was coming on though the final harvest was a few weeks away; most of her neighbors, mundane and not, had already departed from the capitol and settled in the nearby estates and former estates to prepare for the winter. Her condition naturally precluded her from seeing guests, though she suspected Connor or Richard in particular might receive an invitation to attend some party or another, but it did not prevent her from receiving and responding to correspondence. In fact, it increased the volume.

Now dressed, she settled at her writing desk with the breakfast tray close at hand and began to review her letters and accounts.

She could not and did not expect regular letters from the front. Even the ones she would eventually receive would have been looked over by the censors, and would be useless as far as actual news. That would come from the government, and, disappointingly, gossip, which was both highly unreliable and highly stale by the time it came to her. 

As for the diversions the estate offered, there were few. There was the upcoming panic to be had about replacing the most junior members of the household in what would become a carousel of staff in the upcoming years, but after years of living on the estate, everything had begun to run smoothly.

She might even consider renovations, but that would come when the taxes came in later in the year. Disappointingly, the war meant a new levy had been raised, and most of what she collected would not come to the estate. She would not be able to expand the dairy as she had wished to. She might have made up the difference between James and Nathaniel’s salaries, but that was their money. Legally, too, thanks to that law passed last year, but they would not have begrudged her it had she asked. 

The mail from the front might have been slow, but she could write to her mother, and beg her advice. Lady Johanna Devereux was now past her society years, unfortunately widowed and with no desire to take more cavaliers, but she had a wealth of wisdom that her daughter could draw upon.

Georgiana took out a sheet of paper and addressed it, hesitating over what, exactly, could be said plainly in such a missive, and began jotting down the outline of the situation, alluding to the matter of the war and the problem of staffing, hoping her mama would have the sort of suggestion to untie all the problems at once. It would be entirely like her.

So immersed was she that she did not even bother looking up when she heard the door open. By the sound of his boots, it was not Connor, which left only Richard- and when she finished the line and looked up, she saw it was indeed him, gazing out her window at the drive. 

“Darling,” she said, setting down her pen. Since the night the others had gone away, Richard had only come to share her bed twice, and given Connor’s notions of fairness, he had been blocked from joining her any more frequently. It would be unkind to blame the lack of company for her lack of sleep. Richard had always been particular about coming to her anyway, for reasons long known.

He acknowledged her greeting by glancing back her way and nodding, but returned his gaze to the window and the drive beyond it, lifting the curtain with a single finger. She waited.

“I would like your permission to visit my brother,” he said.

Lord Powell’s estate (which was his, as it had been his father’s before him, if originally promised to Richard) was further still than the capitol, and Richard was likely to want to visit for a week at least. Her first and instant impulse was to deny him. He was more likely than not to also dawdle in the capitol, to drink and gamble and vent his demons. Being a cavalier had denied him his inheritance of the family estate; she had not denied him the money his family had settled upon him in the wake of the reveal, so she could not object on the grounds he was wasting _her_ money. As for telling him she would be lonely, it would free Connor to spend every night in her bed, a fact that would not go unmentioned. 

“Has Lord Powell written to you?” she asked, in a pleasant tone. She did not restrict or intercept his mail, though she had a right to.

“I received the invitation last week. He has been ill as of late,” Richard admitted. “But his wife is expecting their child; I did not think he would.”

Georgiana clapped her hands together, smiling. “Oh, but I did not know! I must send her something.”

Richard paused, and Georgiana expected a rejection. She had spoken too soon. Matters involving Richard’s family were always so delicate. His reconciliation with his younger brother was still recent enough to be as fragile as his health, with Richard’s years of exile and their general ignorance, common to so many families of their class, of what exactly occurred between a lady and her cavaliers leaving large gaps in their conversations. 

“They would like that,” he said, and Georgiana's smile resumed. She pushed her letter for her mother to the side and began one for her sister-in-law, suffusing it with congratulations and the usual polite inquiries. Another note to the village silversmith would be next, for the order of a rattle, a common enough order given the delivery of Georgiana’s first litter several years ago.

“How long will you stay?” she asked, and he came to join her at the desk to watch her write. 

“A week,” he said, “Perhaps two, depending on his health. I will not linger and I do not intend to leave you for long.”

She flushed with embarrassment and dipped her pen in the inkwell.

“I know what you think of me,” he said. “And it is true. But I know what I owe you, and I am not nearly so cruel as to intentionally make you miserable.”

“I won’t be miserable,” she protested, setting down her pen. Richard reached to cup her cheek, and bent to kiss her, light and tender.

“I will be a better cavalier when I return,” he murmured. Quickly, she grabbed his wrist, shaking her head.

“You are perfect as you are,” she protested, and he smirked, but did her the courtesy of not voicing the examples that would have rendered her praise hollow.

“I will leave tomorrow, after breakfast,” he said, and she sighed, nodding. She would agree to anything to make him happy. Perhaps this would. When he had first come to her, he had been so much worse. A full reconciliation with his brother, meeting and accepting his brother’s heir- perhaps these would help him finally let go of all he had lost when he presented that he was once entitled to as his father’s eldest son. And perhaps, though she did not like to hope overmuch, there would be a child in this litter that would belong to the estate, to them. It would be near miraculous for her to birth a cavalier this young (and impossible to expect a lady), but the image of Richard with a baby, of Stephan playing with a toddler, of James with a son- her heart clenched. 

And Richard would go to visit his brother and see the land and house that was promised to him from childhood, and the woman that might have been his wife, and he did this willingly and with fraternity in his heart and all jealously suppressed. His anger, she recalled, had never been directed at his _brother_. 

“Do you need to pack?” she asked, and he nodded, drawing away. Richard made a formal bow before he withdrew, his attitude more towards James’ playfulness rather than his own preferred mockery.

“Thank you,” he said, and she smiled, turning her focus back to her letters as he left the room. 

The note for his brother’s wife was superficial enough that it took no time at all, and the note for the silversmith was similarly dashed off and sealed. With trepidation, she considered the note for mama, knowing the ability to word it delicately had left her during her conversation with Richard. She owed Annette a letter, and that came easily as well. A few anecdotes about Thomas, questions about when Annette planned to have her next litter, idle and inoffensive gossip about the capitol, and again, an entreaty to visit. It would have been made more effective if she included mention of Richard’s visit and therefore his absence, but she would not rely on pity to draw her friend to her. 

That done, she was left only with what she was to say to mama. Georgiana hesitated further, hoping for another interruption, but none came. She shifted in her chair, crossed her ankles, and laid her hand on her belly.

_I find myself shocked by my own inability to put things at ease that I know would be solved in a moment for you. Though I know you might say that time makes wisdom and that is all that separates your certainty from mine I never the less find myself thinking your advice imbued with some specific quality._

_I beg your advice on this matter and any in the future that might assault me before I grow into my role._

_Your obedient daughter,_  
_Georgiana_

Satisfied that her earnest desire to do better shone brightly, she had no trouble in baring her distress to the one woman who would understand it utterly. Poor mama was widowed ten years now, and she would have learned to cope. Georgiana’s partings were not so absolute and she would naturally have to take other cavaliers if such a tragedy befell her, but mama would have some advice as to how to deal with the heartsickness and longing.

That massive task overcome, she folded and sealed all the letters and stood to call for a maid, who would fetch a boy to bring the letters to the postmaster in town, hopefully to meet the afternoon mail coach, and then she steeled herself for an errand of her own. 

The layout of the house was particular, with the cavalier’s quarters located on the second floor, rather than on the first, with the lady’s. It almost felt like trespassing to come to this wing. She would not open the closed rooms, though she had the keys, because a small slice of a private life was an easy gift. She longed, though, for one of Nathaniel’s shirts to bury her nose in; some comfort of a physical nature. 

She went to Connor’s door rather than betray that trust, and knocked. As he opened the door, she stepped back.

“Georgiana,” he murmured. His neckcloth was untied, his cuffs unbuttoned. By the fireplace, a breakfast tray rested next to a book. His scent was comforting, as was his gentle tone. 

“Will you go for a walk with me?” she asked, more plaintive than she would have liked. 

“Yes,” he said. His instantaneous agreement was gratifying, less so was the way his face fell a moment later. She frowned, and he shook his head.

“I must dress first,” he said, and she took in his appearance again, beyond the compelling pull of his presence, and nodded. She smiled, a reflex, and stepped further back.

“I hope I have not interrupted,” she said. Connor’s brow furrowed, and he shook his head. “No,” he said, and stepped into the hall to join her. His feet, she noticed, were bare but for his wool stockings. Another step, and he embraced her, holding her to his chest. She relaxed, tucking her face against his chest.

“Richard has spoken to you?” he asked, and she nodded, glad that Richard had cared enough to tell Connor of his difficulties. “Wait for me. I will join you downstairs.”

She let him go, and he lingered before closing the door. Resolute, she went to wait by the entry, catching a nearby maid and having her bring a heavier wooden shawl, which she wrapped around her shoulders. 

The house was as quiet as to be expected with half the occupants absent and the nursery empty. In time, that would change- one, if not the other. 

She waited less than ten minutes, looking out the window and onto the drive, before she heard the sound of boots on the stairs and saw Connor coming down, dressed against the rising chill. 

“Are you warm?” he asked, and settled the shawl more tightly around her shoulders. She nodded, and he did not make a fuss and call for a cloak or gloves, and so out they went.

They walked arm in arm, the ground hard but not yet frozen, and the gravel of the paths firm underfoot. As pleasant as the fresh air was in comparison to that of the capitol, her exercise was limited to what could be had in an easy hour, and with Connor’s support and patiently measured steps. 

He offered pleasant, sparsely worded commentary on the gardens and the livestock, and Georgiana did not chatter to fill up the empty spaces between them. In another life or perhaps later in this one, she would be content with the estate only, and not dream of extending her reach beyond the front gate. But it was in this life that she had been born a lady, and so she made do. She did not envy any of them.

She had once considered what her life would have been like if she had been like any of her sisters. She knew she had them. There had been other children in the nursery, babies in particular, resembling the dolls she had played with. But ultimately the dolls had been more permanent; her brothers and sisters were never in the house long past their weaning, if they were there that long at all, the babies in her mother’s nursery only more realistic toys to her while they were there. What became of them after was only the subject of idle thought, for Georgiana knew the most important facts: they would be cared for, and they were not her concern. If she had been mundane and another girl the cumulation of the hopes of her house, she would have been treated by that girl with the same benevolent ignorance that Georgiana used for the other girl-children her mother had borne. 

She could have been anything if she were not a lady, but as one, her circumstances were completely fixed and out of her control. Rebellion or deviation was not an option, just as one could not knock the sun from the sky. 

It was not a topic she would broach on any other day, but so often had her thoughts strayed along this path today- her own eventual children, Richard’s family, the siblings she had never met- that as they made the final turn back towards the house, she asked Connor a question.

“Do you wonder about your parents?”

His posture did not change, even as his lips briefly pursed. He gave it the same consideration that he had her question on what he thought of the possibility of adding to the dairy.

“No,” he admitted. “Not anymore.”

Georgiana nodded, and squeezed his arm with her free hand, her head briefly coming to rest on his shoulder. Oakley Park came into splendid view before them over the hedges.

A figure was coming up the drive on horseback, and a footman ran out to meet him, a speck in livery. 

Georgiana tried to peer around Connor to get a better view, but he stepped between her and the object of her interest, frowning. That he was terribly far away and not a threat in the least would have been a useless protest. Instead, Georgiana settled for peppering him with questions. 

“Who is it?” she asked. He was too tall for her to peer over his shoulder. 

“I do not know,” Connor said. “The footman has reached him.”

Georgiana waited for further news.

“He gave him a … letter?” Connor hesitated, before continuing his narration. “He is bringing it back to the house. The stranger is not leaving, but he has dismounted.”

“Will he take the horse to the stable?” she asked, and he shook his head. 

“Back to the house,” Connor said gruffly, and his hold on her arm was tighter, now, maneuvering her back along the path, his steps less moderated, Georgiana keeping up at a pace that had her walking in long strides. It was far more laborious than the whole rest of the walk had been.

He was careful to not let them get any closer to the messenger, even though they had to walk in a wide arc to avoid him.

James and the others had really impressed the _most_ stringent version of protocol and cavalier conduct on him. 

Despite the circuitous route, they still managed to return to the front of the house. The door opened and Richard came out, eyes on the stranger even as he came over to stand with the two of them. The footman approached, and so did the messenger, leading his horse.

“What?” Richard said. “What is it?”

“From Lord Powell’s estate,” the messenger said. The footman passed the letter to Georgia, not to Richard. It was addressed to Richard Powell Devereux, of Oakley Park, in a scrawling hand, blotted with ink. It had been written in haste, then. 

Richard stared at it like it was a venomous snake, about to strike. Connor stared at him.

Protocol was such that if she declined to allow Richard the letter, never mind who it was addressed to, he had no right to object. He was, after all, her cavalier. And in that moment, seeing the letter in her hand, and the messenger watching the whole scene, he remembered it. He snarled, about to fling some oath at her, already reaching to snatch it from her. 

Georgiana kept still, fearing anything she said, Richard would misunderstand. He tore open the seal, unfolding the page. It was only a few lines of text, in the same heavily-slanted hand. It should not have taken long to read, but the pause stretched between them, Richard staring down at the paper, Connor watchful at her elbow.

“My brother is dead,” he said. All the venom was gone from his voice, leaving it hollow. 


	5. Unexpected

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to brigantines for 'yes, and'-ing every idea.

"Round the corner," James said, tugging at her hand and pulling her into the stables. It smelled pleasantly of sweet hay and the underlying scent of horse, though nearly all the stalls were empty and with placards declaring the names of absent occupants.

"The footman told me they barely use this one anymore," he said. "They like to keep the foaling mares closer to the house, and I thought..."

"Privacy," she said, and he grinned, stepping forward. Georgiana stepped back, leaning against the smooth wood of a stall, her boots dusting through clean straw and against the cobbles underneath. 

"Right," he said, and he pressed against her, hip to hip, looking down at her with a grin that wouldn't be out of place on the devil.

"Mrs. Standish has been nothing but accommodating," she started, and he held her at the waist. 

"You've got needs," he interrupted. "I've got needs. It's been hell, smelling you across the room and knowing I can't have you."

"We can't impose on her," Georgiana argued. "They're an old family. Three generations since the last new blood. I don't want to scare her after her kind invitation to visit. She doesn't know how the estates are run, how we conduct ourselves, for all that she’s taken over an old estate."

"So that's why we're out _here_ ," James pointed out, "and not on the lovely featherbed in your room, though I'd cut off my left hand to have you on it.”

While he spoke, he knelt, looking up at her from amid the hay. He slid his hand up under her dress and petticoat, his palm warm as it inched up her thigh, the leather glove smoother than his skin.

“I can smell it. You're soaked. You need me. And she's going to want a babe for herself from your first litter. Why she invited you here, to make the request in too formal a setting for you to refuse, I wager, so why not practice making her one."

"Fifteen minutes," she said, and let herself sag against the wall, feeling his fingertips drag against the outside of her thigh. "If you can manage in fifteen minutes, they won't notice we've been gone."

"Done," he promised, and took his hand away to her displeasure, only to pull the glove off, tucking it in his vest for safe-keeping. He flipped up her skirts so he could get his mouth between her legs. Georgiana held up the hem with one hand and gripped his hair with the other. She braced herself as he nuzzled her thighs in an introduction, the first prickles of his beard sharp on her skin.

There was simply no explanation for his talents other than experience, as much as it irritated something small and feral in Georgiana to imagine him with some other woman (and here her fingers tightened in his hair) he had to have learned to eat cunt somewhere. His enthusiasm was boundless, and _that_ she knew was all for her. Two fingers inside her was just enough to tease as he thrust them in time with lapping and suckling at her clit. 

She'd been aroused all morning, it was true, throughout introductions and breakfast and the small talk after. It was James, entirely. Acclimating to having him around was bound to be just that, an adjustment, while she learned how to navigate the occasionally overwhelming press of his arousal and presence while reining in her own newfound hold over him. But he'd still been unattached for years before he met her, with the full needs of a cavalier and very few accepted outlets, besides fucking the very few willing to try a knot for entertainment's sake and fighting. 

While she wouldn't breed for a year or two yet, she smelled like she was in heat, triggered by her proximity to James, drawing unattached cavaliers while sane enough to evaluate them. Their hosts couldn’t smell it, but James was just as affected as if she truly was in season. They had no reason to deny one another besides propriety, and as he’d said, if Mrs. Standish wanted one from her first litter that badly, she would be willing to overlook the absence of her guests for a quarter of an hour.

His mouth and lips were glossy with spittle and her wetness when he pulled back, and he made sure to lick his lips while gazing up at her. She shivered, and he flexed his fingers inside her in time with it, the pleasure prickling down her spine, tight and centered inside her.

"No knot," he said, and rose to his feet. He was undoing the front of his trousers when she reached for him, and she caught him confused before she drew him in to kiss her. She liked the way she tasted, the tangy saltiness, and it was good from his mouth too, as good as knowing she had every right to rip out his throat should he touch any other woman again.

He pulled away, and he was smiling, grinning as broad as when he told a clever joke, proud as a peacock. 

"I did good, then," and she scoffed, slapping away his hands so she could undo the last button of his trousers and pull his shirt out of the way to get at his cock. She had been afraid on the first night, fearing being split in two despite all the assurances from her mother that there was nothing to worry about. Georgiana had known what to expect. Even if the fundamentals of reproduction had not been a standard and necessary part of her education, she had plenty of opportunity to witness everything from the stallions and geldings in the meadows to the bulls in the paddocks, and James in truth bore a great deal of resemblance to the former in how her fingers could not span him, and his sack hung between his legs like apples on an overfull branch. His knot was already visible, a fat lump near the base, and she wrapped her fingers around and squeezed just to hear him whine and curse her, and laugh merrily in her reply. 

“I’ll lay you in the straw, I will,” he threatened, even as he kissed her cheek. 

“How are we to manage?” she asked, and he pulled up a fistful of her skirt, shoving it against her fist until she added it to her clutch.

“Against the wall,” he said gruffly. “Mind your head. I’ll lift- legs around my waist, there we go, my love.”

She had the free hand, and so she held him steady as he lowered her onto his cock. Gravity did most of the work. The head was tapered enough that she found it never gave her much trouble, but working the length inside her was slower than she would have liked. He rocked his hips, and inch by inch, he slid deeper. She loved the way her focus narrowed to them, to the strain on James’ face, the feeling of being impaled slowly. He no longer bottomed out halfway inside, his knot swollen and uncomfortable, and her too tight for real enjoyment. Eventually, she would be able to sheathe him with ease, though that was months away still. 

Still dressed and corseted, she could not see the bulge under her own skin that belied how far inside her he was. But she felt it, keenly, tight enough around him that Georgiana could swear she could feel his pulse through the fat veins along his shaft in her very core. She crossed her ankles at the small of his back, settling, and looked up to find that his eyes had that glassy look she loved so well.

“No knot,” she reminded him, and he grunted in reply, raising his head to peck her on the neck.

“Just want to make you come,” he rasped.

Then he began to fuck her.

It was bliss. With every thrust, even as shallow as they were, he rammed against the spot inside her that her fingers no longer could reach. She was still wound tightly from his mouth, flushed and tingling; a hand between her own legs would finish her off. Georgiana instead held his cheek to kiss him. He growled low in his throat before he opened his mouth for her. She was sloppy, more tongue than grace as she licked into his mouth, pleased when he returned the affection. Their teeth clicked when a thrust jarred her particularly hard, and she pulled back, gasping for air and whining in a most unladylike fashion, her head thrown back against the wall. Somewhere, in one of the occupied stalls, a horse snorted and stomped. 

And then she saw him.

He stood in the dark of the furthest stalls, frozen in mid-step. By now her eyes had adjusted to the light, and she could see that he must have been a stablehand, large in the shoulders and wearing what looked to be well-worn clothes. He was not so far that she could not see his eyes, and the moment they met, she felt a jolt of shame, of embarrassment so keen and sharp that it burst into arousal, and she cried out as James fucked into her.

“James,” she said, and he groaned, more than likely assuming it was her calling out his name in wild abandon. “ _James_ ,” she hissed a second time, holding his face between her hands, nails digging into his skin. His expression snapped from slack lust to awareness, the fear in her voice cutting through and wringing a growl out of him as his priorities snapped from fucking his lady to defending her.

He pulled away and out of her, which _hurt_ , and pushed Georgiana behind him as he turned, one hand yanking his trousers up, the other going for the knife in his boot as he looked for what was distressing her. He saw the man- the boy, really- in an instant, and relaxed, shoulders dropping, the rumble in his throat stopping immediately.

“Get along now, son,” he said, though there was iron behind the friendly tone. “Nothing here for you.”

Georgiana turned her face away to better disguise it, to seek some measure of privacy. She had feared just this sort of discovery, and now that it had happened, she found herself at least grateful that it was with the sort of person who could only gossip to the other staff, and not with any credibility. While he had seen a great deal, it would be the exact sort of story an overactive boy might make up, and the only evidence would be scent, which the majority mundane household would be unaware of.

In all fairness, there was a great deal of that, the false heat with the notes of James’ scent below. James was still intent on the other man, and Georgiana thought to tug his coat to draw his attention, to make their discrete if limping exit, but then she heard the growl. 

It did not come from James, though she soon felt one echo through his chest in reply to the challenge. The other man had not fled. If anything, he had come closer, now with bared teeth and a growl like gravel in a tin cup, new and untested. 

“James,” Georgiana said very slowly, as he pulled away from her to face the threat. He did not need reassurance at this moment. 

She was unfamiliar with cavalier fights. Her fathers had been settled in their hierarchy since well before her birth, and she had only James, but they had been covered in her education. A practical demonstration, she now realized, would have been unnecessary. There was nothing coy or subtle about judging the intentions of cavaliers who had decided they needed to fight. The intensity of their body language and what had sparked it was enough.

This was not a little tussle. This was a challenge from the younger man, seeking the prize of a lady in heat. Both he and James were beyond logic, and would solve the matter in the most brutal way possible. 

She was expecting it when the other man leapt for James and they fell to the hay, snarling and wrestling on the stable floor. The man fought like a wildcat, and James was defending his territory, but even as James began to gain the upper hand, the other man just continued to try and toss him off to get closer to Georgiana, snapping and scrabbling. 

He pinned James briefly, his weight against James’ chest, but she proved too great a distraction. He looked up at her and whimpered, and she realized what a particular shade of amber his eyes were. Then James had him by the waist and he was back to thrashing. He had no real skill, no style, no _experience_ , and James was a hardened veteran and one of several cavalier sons. Youth could not overcome seniority.

James, trousers around his knees, pressed his brief advantage and soon had the other man pinned.

“What’s wrong with him?” Georgiana asked, watching James press him to the ground, still keeping to the wall. James had years and mass, but the other man seemed possessed, fighting him without respect for the bruises and scratches he was inflicting on himself. “Is he in rut?”

It was the only explanation she could come to as to why his focus had not entirely been on his opponent rather than the prize.

“Not a rut,” James said, “not a rut, he’s just-- fucking hell,” he cursed, because the other man snarled and kicked out, his aim solid, meeting James’ knee with a sickening noise. James fell, and took the other man with him. There was yet more snarling and snapping, and for a brief moment, it looked as if the younger man might win.

James pinned him again a moment later.

“It’s not a true rut, he’s just displaying for the first time, and it’s coming on hard, because you’re here, and you smell ripe,” James said. His eyes were hard as he pressed the other man down and looked up at her. “You need to choose, Georgiana. You need to take him or let me put him down and call the house for help to get him somewhere safe. He’s old to present, and you being here makes it stronger.” 

Hair flopped in front of his face, clothes second-hand and too short in the wrist and ankle, obviously indicating a recent growth spurt or being in the midst of one, tight in the crotch for obvious reasons, this cavalier was obviously not creche-raised, trained as James had been in good manners and restraint. He was the stableboy in a mundane house, maybe an orphan, with no recommendations for his character or temperament once out of the false rut. She was pressed against the wall still, her palms flat against the wood.

“Did you go through this?” she asked, and James hesitated before answering, “Something like it. No ladies were around,” and his momentary distraction caught him an elbow to the ribs. 

“Georgiana,” James warned, and the man made another bid for her, trying to shake James off.

What would happen to him if she turned him away? When he had his proper cavalier muscle and height? With no familial backing, no chance of finding a lady? He’d have to be tied down to restrain him while he waited out the madness, and then what? 

She sank to her knees in the straw. The stable was immaculate, the few horses in excellent health. That had to say something about him.

“Yield,” she said to James, offering her wrist out towards them. “I’ll have him. Yield.”

James stilled, and the man twisted again. James snapped back and growled, pinning the man under him.

“I’ll not _yield_ to someone half my age,” James hissed. He yanked at the man’s collar and Georgiana heard cloth tear. He wrenched the man’s head aside and bent his own, biting down on the man’s neck. The man yelped, and then was, _finally_ , still, but for the heaves of his chest. When James rose, it was with a bloody mouth.

“I’m your first,” he muttered, and clamored over the other man to come back to her, pushing her back onto the straw. “I’ll not yield to any other cavalier.” 

He kissed her, and it was all copper. Under him, she squirmed, inhaled his scent, now tinted with that of the other cavalier. His cock had softened a bit during the fight, but excitement kept it plump and he thrust against her thigh to remind her. When he tried to pull away she held him there for a moment more, their noises bumping. 

“You are,” she said, and he exhaled and pulled away.

“I’ll be right here,” he said, as the man shakily rolled over, rising unsteadily to his knees. James had snapped him out of the mindless rut, but he was still twitchy, glancing between her and him. He was around her age, Georgiana supposed. Maybe younger, though not by much. He reached up to touch his shoulder, and glanced at the blood on his fingertips with alarm.

“It’s alright,” James said, raising his hands, showing empty palms. He looked wild himself, half-hard cock slumped against his thigh, clothes askew from the scuffle. Georgiana wasn’t much better, though at least her cunt was still covered by her dress. “My lady’s said she’ll have you.”

“I do not- I don’t understand,” he said, still glancing between his hand and James. “Why am I- why do I feel-”

“No one caught it when you were whelped. You’re a cavalier,” James said, nice and blunt, and Georgiana loved him for it. “Cock on legs, knot brained, sure you’ve heard and told the jokes. This,” and he jerked his head at Georgiana, “is your lady. Once you’re in your right mind, she’ll have a contract written for you with your people. You have people?”

“Dead,” he said, and James nodded. “Doesn’t matter. She’ll make it proper and you’ll come with us.”

“I,” he began, and swallowed. His hand wandered to his crotch, palm flat, trying to cover the lump in the too-tight trousers.

“What’s your name?” James asked him.

“Connor,” he said with finality. No family name.

“Connor,” Georgiana tried. He looked at her now, and she offered her arm, fingers curled, wrist bared. 

“Go on,” James said. “Scent her.”

Again, Connor glanced between them. “How?”

James reached for his hand and Connor gave it up. James brought it to his nose and inhaled, lips brushing his skin. Connor watched him with lidded eyes, and when James pulled away, he did not let go, surging forward to kiss the older man. Dazed confusion on his part broke away to be replaced by a hesitant response, his lips parting, a response to James’ body that was not fear. 

To Georgiana, it was all much better than what they’d been doing to one another moments ago.

When Connor pulled away, James looked very pleased with himself still, reaching down to palm himself and then squeeze, hissing and rocking into his own palm. Connor stared, transfixed, but shook himself out of it and then reached for Georgiana’s hand, though not taking it. She laid it in his palm without hesitation, and as James had showed him, he pressed his nose to her wrist and breathed. The heat of his breath on the thin skin was magnified tenfold, as was the feel of his lips, chapped but wet. Rather than kiss, he licked, and James watched her shiver with a lecherous eye. 

He took it as an invitation to kiss her. Connor rumbled a growl beside them, and Georgiana broke away. His eyes were hazy again, focused on James, and this, at least, Georgiana knew how to handle. 

She would have preferred a bed.

Lying back in the straw caught his attention. Pulling her dress and petticoat up over her knees and thighs captured it, and Connor clambered over on his hands and knees to sit above her, already fumbling with the ties of his trousers. He snapped at James’ hand when it touched his shoulder, but James snarled a warning and Connor flinched.

Georgiana grabbed his hand rather than letting the drama between the two of them play out.

“I’m your lady,” she said. His shirt had torn down the front, and she could stroke his chest. “And I want him here, and I want you here, so you must be sweet to him.”

Connor blinked slowly, and Georgiana smiled for him.

“Kiss me,” she said, and he dipped his head to oblige her. He pushed his tongue into her mouth clumsily and she stifled a laugh. Connor pulled away, frowning, and Georgiana reached for his trousers, undoing them where he’d only been clumsy. She eased him free, and he filled her grip without overflowing. His knot was undefined-- absent, if she was to be frank, and if he did not stink of cavalier aggression, she would have questioned his alignment.

She looked back up to see Connor staring at her, brow creased, lips set in a tight line.

“It won’t hurt,” she said.

Her dress, hiked indecently, baring her stockings and ribbon garters, gave him the access he needed to mount her. She likely had straw in her hair, as befitted the unexpected crudeness of the setting. He was not so refined to refuse her based on an unkempt appearance. And yet he hesitated.

“What if I get you with child?” he asked. There was the faintest tremble to his muscles, like a horse ridden too hard. She admired his restraint, that caution was able to overpower instinct. 

“Can’t,” James cut in. He was off to the side, and Connor’s bulk cut him off from her view. Rather than question him, Connor looked to her for confirmation.

“You won’t,” she soothed, and his shoulders slumped. But relief abated, and his mouth slackened as he turned to his new purpose and focus. 

At first, he rutted against her thigh, too clumsy to thrust inside, and Georgiana spread her legs wider and took him in hand to guide him inside. He held her waist with both hands and tried to find a rhythm, all stuttering inexperienced, slipping out twice in his overeagerness and hissing in frustration. The straw crunched as James laid down beside her.

“He’ll try and knot you,” James said, and Georgiana frowned. “‘Try’?”

Above her, Connor grunted, flashing the barest glint of teeth, but he didn’t growl again. Georgiana stroked his cheek.

“Won’t be big enough yet.”

“You’re sure?” Georgiana pressed.

“I remember mine,” James said. “Or it will be, but it won’t be as large as mine.”

She let James have his prideful comment, and waited until Connor regained enough confidence to begin moving again. She wasn’t expecting much out of it. Really, she had been spoiled by James. Being agitated would just make him want to breed her faster when he was unsure of his hold over her. Still, she made all the appropriate noises to urge him on.

“Stop,” James said, and Connor stilled, bottomed out inside her. His heartbeat thumped in Georgiana’s ears.

“Here’s how she likes it,” he said, and Connor flinched, turning to look at James’ face over his shoulder. 

“She does not now?” Connor asked. Georgiana refused to do James the kindness of meeting his eyes.

“Not as much as she ought,” he said, and cloth rustled as he pulled Connor’s trousers down further. “Relax,” he said, and Georgiana’s imagination filled in what she could not see as Connor gasped and flinched away from James’ hand-- which meant that he drove into her instead. 

“Shh,” James murmured, and Connor, his mouth all resentful lines, turned to look over his shoulder. Georgiana drew his attention back with a low noise, and she heard the slick sounds as James began to thrust his fingers in and out of Connor’s ass. Whatever he’d use for slick made the most lurid, sloppy noises. Connor buried his face in the curve of her neck.

“Like this,” James instructed.

When Connor began to thrust again, it wasn’t the rabbit-quick urgency of before. It was James’ technique, copied whole cloth, but it was good, and it was slow enough that she could enjoy herself. Connor looked like he was enjoying himself too, skin blushed dark, eyes lidded, and his hands found her breasts, cupping and squeezing the flesh and all the layers of cloth between. 

“ _Lady_ ,” he breathed, reverent, and Georgiana resisted the urge to sink her teeth into where James had already bitten.

“Georgiana,” she corrected, and he moaned her name. Lust jolted through her veins like hot syrup and soaked her cunt. Smaller than James, he didn’t stuff her so full that every thrust felt like drove out all the air in her lungs, and she could feel his knot swelling, slowly stretching her wider around it, rather than waiting for the massive thing to be popped into her just before he came. 

James had said he wouldn’t be able to knot her, but she felt sure he might be able to. She lifted one leg and hooked it around his waist. She could feel where he calf brushed against James’ wrist as he continued to fingerfuck Connor in a guiding tempo, either driving himself forward into her wet heat or back onto James’ fingers. The whole of it was driving Connor back into that mindless rut, and even if it was false, it was still close enough to the real thing to leave him half mad.

James withdrew his hand, and Connor growled. Now, Georgiana did bite down, though it might well have been to keep herself steady, tasting blood and feeling the familiar sink of her teeth into soft flesh. The thrusts became staccato, deep and hard, but this time she hardly minded. Her own orgasm was nothing in comparison to his, a brief tensing of her body next to the first swelling of his knot, catching in the tightness of her cunt, and the shuddering demands of his own body. Then, panic began to set in as he realized he could not move, could not withdraw, and tried to push her away. She might have actually taken a bite out for him if not for the sudden rigidity of his body as he came, the hot spurt of his come kept inside her by his burgeoning knot. The thought of what size it would be after his growth spurt rushed through her, an afterimage of her orgasm, and she forgave him when he collapsed on top of her in the wake of the final jerk of his hips, his ordeal over. 

She released his shoulder and scrubbed her teeth with her tongue to get the blood off, head lolling to the side in the soft, fragrant straw. Georgiana pet him like an animal she was trying to soothe, not demanding conversation or consciousness from him. She heard James moving around, though he was out of her field of vision. Connor’s breath slowed and eased into a more peaceful rhythm, and James rejoined them, sitting in the straw near her head and wiping his wet hands off with a handkerchief.

“Changed your mind?” he asked, and Georgiana shook her head. Her arms, wrapped around him, could be taken as possessive.

“You may need to go up to the house in my stead,” she said, gently. James nodded, and looked towards the door. He got the look on his face that meant he was chewing over his words, and Georgiana waited for him to gather himself and finally speak.

“He’s got a lot to learn,” James said, slowly. “We don’t- you shouldn’t hear these things, but there are lessons to be learned from fathers, from brothers. He won’t have all of that. He might never learn all of it.”

“The social aspects?” Georgiana asked. James hesitated.

“The way we behave among one another,” he said. “It’s not right for the lady to see how we sort that out. The public manners can be learned easily enough and how to keep you and the household safe. Then there’s pleasing you, keeping you happy.”

She did not reply, still stroking Connor’s hair. 

“I will teach him that,” James said. “But he won’t be…”

“‘Won’t be’ what?” she asked. 

“Creche-born,” he said. “Well mannered. Trained to it from birth.”

“Like you,” she said, following his implications.

“Like me,” he agreed, watching her.

“You told me as much before,” she pointed out. “My feelings haven’t changed. He’s my cavalier. I’ll make him a Devereux once…” and she faltered. 

“You need to go up to the main house and tell them what happened,” she said grimly. “Give them my regrets and I’ll… I’ll find some way to apologize.”

Connor’s body was warm and his scent was comforting, even though new. With time, it would become as familiar to her as James’. His breath was still even in a way that spoke to her of sleep, so when he spoke, she was shocked.

“They will be glad to be rid of me,” he said. He braced himself to rise off her.

“Wait,” Georgiana said, holding him still. 

“She likes to be held,” James said to him, almost apologetically. 

“No,” she said, “not that, but I do. Why will the Standishes be pleased to be rid of you?”

“I am useless now.”

When he tried to get off her now, she let him go. The usual spurt of seed accompanied his withdrawal and would surely leave a spot on the back of her dress. 

“Hardly,” she objected, and James cut in. “You’re about to put on weight and bulk and grow into yourself. Mundane men won’t compare.”

Connor was already tall, and she noticed it more now, laying in the straw, watching him fold his arms as if to ward off the chill. He would eat them out of house and home over the next year, and get perhaps half a handspan’s worth of additional height from it. Already muscled, but lean, she expected him to, as James said, put on a bit of bulk. It would help him grow out of his current coltish look.

“Which is a problem in and of itself,” James continued. “Can’t discipline a man twice your size by smacking up upside the head. Which is why they won’t keep him on, Georgiana.”

Connor flinched. She took it as an agreement. 

“Well,” she said, “you shan’t be useless to me.”

Georgiana sat up, doing her best to rearrange her dress. At least James had proven somewhat good at rearranging hair. 

“I am a bastard. A foundling,” he said. “I have no pedigree. You will get no good children off me.” 

“Why do you say that?” she asked. “Was that why you asked about getting me with child?”

She took his silence as confirmation. 

“What a thoroughly modern idea,” James said, rebuttoning his trousers. “Rest assured, it is her name that matters. No one cares a whit about us.”

Georgiana gave him another significant look, but given that his speech had seemed to help Connor, or at least had not hurt him (some of the wretched woefulness leaving his expression) she could think of nothing else to say.

Redressed, James brushed the straw off his trousers. Georgiana pulled down the hem of her petticoats, for all the good it would do.

“I am off to make amends,” he said grandly. In a less theatrical tone, he said to Connor, “Take care of her while I’m gone, won’t you?”


	6. Guest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Brief note: Morganstern has been renamed Moncrieff. All edits have been made to make the change in earlier chapters. I hadn't meant to give the character an Ashkenazic family name and so changed it lest it imply something I had no intention of implying.

Richard left as he meant to that afternoon. He thrust the letter from his brother into her hand before he departed in the carriage, dressed in mourning and with no goodbye. There was no smell of whiskey on his breath, which she took reassuringly, but he did not meet her eyes, which she did not.

The letter she folded neatly and tucked into her desk for safe keeping, and then she did not write for several days. Annette sent her a reply, which she left unopened, and Connor took the notes from the tradesmen and handled the matters therein. Her town-appropriate gowns were boxed away, and out came the dresses for the last half of her pregnancies, the ones that were really just heaps of gathered fabric that could be belted prettily under the bust with a nice thick ribbon, and had handy buttons for when she needed to nurse. They were off-white, all of them, because they could be scoured without thought to the dye wearing, and with them came the shifts that were more like mainsails, so much linen went into their construction.

Her belly grew by the day, less a polite swelling and more a swollen bulb. The weight of it began to curve her spine, affecting swaying hips and coquetry where she felt none. The morning she woke up to wet spots on the front of her nightgown she sighed rather than delighted in them. She slept alone, she watched the road from her window, and she could not follow the plot of even the most vacuous novel. 

Connor let her carry on for a week in this state.

He stayed with her during the day, took his meals at the same time, and dredged up enough conversation, even if it was just five-word sentences about this observation or that, for which she could hum agreement or murmur disagreement. She knew he felt desire for her body, even as it changed, but he waited, the fires banked, and she loved him more for it, as dull as all her feelings were.

“Lady Symington should visit before the snow starts,” he said, and she murmured her agreement to the sensibility of the idea, generally. It was not until the rider left with the day’s post that she realized he had sent an invitation for Annette in his own hand with it. He had no right; except for where a cavalier’s first and only loyalty was to his lady.

That night, when he was about to leave for his own room, all the light in the room extinguished but for the candle by her bed, she spoke as he stood to leave. 

“Wait,” she said. She was slow to stand, weighed by her belly and breasts, but Connor obliged her and came to her chair to take her hand and help her up. She was already holding his arm when she said, “Stay.”

He tensed. She felt his arm flex under her fingers, and she shook her head and took a step away, anticipating that he would follow. 

“Be careful,” he said, already moving to put his arm around her waist, to keep her as close to the bulwark of his body as possible. 

She laughed at his overly cautious handling, and stood on the tips of her toes to kiss his cheek.

“I don’t remember you being so solicitous the last time I was with child,” she said. He grit his teeth, and then said, “You had all five of us.”

She took another step, and then he did too, and then they were walking from the sitting room to the bedroom, he obliged to come with her. 

“They will return soon,” she said, because that’s what they had told her, all of them, even Richard in his own way, and at the moment, she felt like believing them. 

“You are not meant to be so poorly guarded,” he said, and waited as she sat herself on the bed. Out of habit, she bent to remove her slippers, only to be stymied in her efforts. Connor knelt and began to slide them off her feet. If he had not been there, she would have had to call a maid. The intimacy of his hand cupping her heel was much more welcome.

“You were right to write to Annette on my behalf,” she said. “I am tired of being sad.”

He set the slippers nearly by the bedpost, and stood. 

“Will you come to bed?” she asked again, making the invitation clear.

His expression softened, or at least went from stony neutrality to something softer around the eyes, and he nodded. Georgiana turned down the bed and eased herself in. She slid to the far side as Connor sat and removed his own slippers and unbelted his robe, tossing it over the foot of the bed. 

“Your hands are cold,” she said as he laid down beside her. She took possession of his hand and pressed it to her cheek to illustrate her point. Connor blew out the lamp by the bedside before he gave her his attention, which was to shake his head and stroke her hair, along her temple to the start of the braid she’d done it up in for sleep. 

“You run hot,” he corrected, and she shook her head.

“I hate that,” she said.

“What?”

“That you know me so well.”

He blinked, visible only in the dark in how she briefly lost sight of the gloss of his eyes.

“No,” she said, and sighed. “It is like with Annette, I think. It is not hate, it is… will I ever be able to do the same for you?”

“You are not meant to be as devoted to us as we are to you,” he said. “A cavalier is… replaceable. A lady is not.”

“Did James teach you that? Nathaniel?”

“No,” he said, placid. “It is a plain truth.”

Rueful, she shook her head, and he cupped the back of her neck. His fingers had warmed some.

“I do not feel like you do not see me,” he said. “You wanted me.”

How simple he made it sound, the wanting. He had never given her cause to regret it. 

“You are never ashamed of me. You trust me with the accounts. You do not treat me like I am stupid.”

“You aren’t!” Georgiana protested, slapping her palm against the center of his chest. “Has someone said that?”

“No,” he said, and her fingers curled against his skin as she relaxed. “And you come to me for comfort. More than you go to even James.”

He was very definitely smug about that. He even smiled, teeth glinting in the dark. 

“Let me take care of you,” he coaxed. He pulled her closer, her head tucked against his broad chest. “Let me do this for you.”

She turned her face up to him like a flower to the sun as he began to kiss her, her forehead, her cheeks, her nose. His large hand ran down her arm and them up along the curve of her hip, her waist, coming to rest on her belly.

“You carry _my_ get,” he said, and the smugness was still there. “Take _my_ knot. I am yours, and you are mine.”

She kissed him then, her teeth slamming against her lip in the surge to reach him. Chapped from the cold and her inattention, it split, and there was blood in their kiss, and Connor’s tongue probing for the source. When she pulled away, he kissed her forehead again.

“I will keep you safe until the others return. It is my honor. I will not let you despair when there is nothing to be sad for.”

“Thank you,” she said, and he continued to stroke her hair. Her breathing evened, and she felt herself drifting off. She went to snuggled closer to him, her breasts pillowed against his chest, and in the haze of near dreaming, she only half felt the release, the warmth. Connor certainly didn’t, not until she squirmed away, and that had him at full alert, throwing the covers back and sitting up, curved over her to shield her.

“What?” he asked. Georgiana would have crossed her arms over her chest but she was too large for that. Instead, she took his hand, and pressed it to the front of her nightdress, the damp spot of linen. He brought his fingers to his noise, inhaled, and then to his mouth, where his tongue darted out to lick the wet pads of his fingers.

“Already?” he asked, and Georgiana nodded.

Connor settled back down, pulling the covers back around them. During her first pregnancy, all of her cavaliers had drunk from her at one point or another, but she hadn’t gotten her milk until mere days before, and once she’d had the litter, it had all gone to them. 

His tongue darted out to wet his lips. He looked from the wet spots on the fabric, to her, and she reached for the ties at her neckline, undoing the bow. She felt clumsy and poorly-made as she pulled the gown down over her breasts, but Connor’s hands were gentle as he eased them free, and his eyes were rapt on the flesh he could barely see in the dark of the room.

Already, they’d swollen larger than his head, the bud of her nipple swallowed by the surrounding flesh, the inverted slit still leaking translucent milk. Connor pressed his lips to the slit and probed it with his tongue, pushing inside. Georgiana couldn’t help the soft whimper, tongue pressed to the roof of her mouth. The weight made her back ache, and she knew the size of the litter meant she could only expect them to continue to grow. If even Richard was here, she might have expected to have him help her drain them, he and Connor each taking a breast in the evening and relieving her. She had been reluctant to ask.

It felt good now, a hard suck from Connor’s mouth popping the bud back to fullness. His lips were pursed tight, his throat working as he swallowed, his face mashed against her breast. Georgiana rested her hands on top of his head, stroking sleepily as he continued to drink, the soft noises in his throat little grunts of satisfaction. 

She was startled when he began to rub against her thigh, feeling his erection through his nightshirt. His grunts had gone ragged, in time with the thrusts against her thigh, his pulls on her nipple hard enough to suck more flesh into his mouth than just the pert bud. He took her wrists in one massive hand and pushed them over her head as he rolled her into her back, her tits spilling and slapping against her chin.

He hadn’t let go through all of that, but now he pulled back, her nipple falling from his mouth, swollen from the suction and more red than pink. Milk dripped down his chin, and he licked his lips before he wiped the back of his mouth with his free hand, easing himself back down to latch on to her other tit, still so full as to spill over.

He dragged the flat of his tongue along the bud, smearing the leaking milk rather than sucking it away, and Georgiana fought his hold.

“Connor,” she said, “Connor, _please_.”

She could not see his cock, blocked by her belly. He hung over her, the muscles of his abdomen hard, the sinew in his arms flexing as she twisted in no real protest. He dipped his head again and this time his lips closed around the nipple, sucking it and half the areola into his mouth too. His reward was the spurt of milk he swallowed, throat working, and he dragged his cock against the underside of her swollen belly while he kept suckling in hard pulses, the thrusts matching. 

He watched her all the while, every time she glanced down finding he was staring at her, his dark eyes smoldering. He had attended to her during her heat; bred her fat and full of young that even now weighed her down and kept her from wiggling free of him. But that was hardly a negative; she did not want to be free of him. She wanted him to drink her tit dry and then go back to the left, do it all again, put his mouth on her cunt and lick up all the slick he’d wrung from her, and then bury himself inside her, spilling seed over her ripe womb.

“You taste _sweet_ ,” he said, when he pulled away. Some of the milk dribbled down his chin, and she gasped when he latched on again, the breast already wet from all she had dripped and spurted, let alone his spit. 

_’Of course,’_ she wanted to tell him. How could she be anything but sweet for him? He knew very well how she tasted, though now he did not have to share that sweetness with anyone else. Apparently his appetite went beyond a few pulls, beyond _sharing_. 

Once she stopped twisting in his grip, he let her hands go, too absorbed in his task, his throat contracting as he continued to nurse. She ran her fingers through his dark hair, petting. Georgiana could not press him closer, his face mashed against her breast, hot little puffs of air escaping from his noise as he breathed. He lingered this time. Perhaps he savored the intimacy as much as she did. Certainly, he enjoyed not being one of several hungry mouths, needing to swallow his fill quickly lest he be jostled from his spot or not be allowed his fill. 

Georgian was very nearly startled when he pulled away, nearly broken out of her contented stupor. 

He rolled her to her front, ass up, fussing briefly with the pillows. Georgiana floated, her only protest a soft cry, but both of them were beyond words, Connor grunting in satisfaction once she was settled appropriately. Her legs were parted and her cunt and ass both bare to him, and she shivered when he pressed his thumb against her hole, anticipating, perhaps, a surprise from him. She would have allowed it- she would have allowed him anything, but he didn’t push further. He lined himself up with her cunt and pushed in, his hands tight on a waist that all too quickly swelled into her belly. He pulled her back onto him, rocked her forward, and in this way they fucked, the bed creaking and Connor panting while Georgiana pressed her face into the pillow to muffle the sounds she made. 

It was not five cavaliers, five sets of hands, cock after cock and a warm cradle of adoration and safety and satisfaction, but it was near perfection anyway. Georgiana came, moaning against the spit-damp spot on the pillow under her, and Connor groaned. He came a handful of thrusts later. Georgiana hardly noticed the knot. 

She did notice when he withdrew, and then maybe she did briefly long for a second to take Connor’s place. But she was suddenly exhausted, and to her shame could not cooperate as elegantly as she might have when Connor, stumbling, helped her clean herself up and rolled them both to a dry part of the mattress.

They slept very contentedly wrapped up in one another, his arm secure about her waist. 

* * *

  
“I have a balm for that,” Annette said, a moment after she stepped out of her carriage, and Georgiana reached to touch her lip without thinking. 

“It is not your fault,” Georgiana said, automatically. She had simply been so happy to see Annette that she had smiled, which had pulled the still-healing skin tight, and spit the cut right open again. 

“I will gladly take the blame for making you happy,” her friend said warmly, and Georgiana smiled wider before she winced.

“We ought to get inside,” she said, and Annette dismissed the lighter haired cavalier at her left. He bowed to Georgiana before retreating back to the carriage. Ernest, at her right, accompanied them inside.

“That was Philip, wasn’t it?” Georgiana asked, almost embarrassed that she didn’t recall the young man’s name. Annette nodded.

“He’s lovely,” Annette said, and her smile was small and aimed at her shoes. The lovely glow of happiness suffused her much like a candle in a little tin lantern, and Georgiana was delighted by it. 

“He has settled into the household,” Ernest said, and Connor grunted in somewhat of an affirmative. Georgiana, holding tight to his arm, her steps small and hobbling the whole party to their pace, supposed that it was acceptable, as answers went. 

“So,” she continued, as they came to the sitting room. “We are matched now, are we not? Five and five?”

Connor helped her sit, and reached for the wrap she’d discarded earlier over the back of the sofa. She shook her head, and he left it, preferring to keep watch standing behind her, looming over the rest of the party rather than settling down beside her. 

“We are,” Annette agreed, settling in across from her. 

“I envy James his servicemen,” Ernest said to Connor. “I think it must have been easier to get you all in line when half of you were so accustomed to following orders.”  
“We were not very rowdy,” Connor replied, after a moment, and Georgiana exhaled, hoping it did not sound too much like a relieved sigh. Ernest and Connor _knew_ one another. If there was any cavalier that he would have been willing to allow around her, it would be him. And she had to give him credit for fighting instinct to snap or growl at Philip, a complete unknown who had made Georgiana’s skin itch, even if he did smell more like Annette by this point than foreign, unattached cavalier. 

“I am glad to hear it,” she said, and looked up to smile at him, his face upside down but softening with a smile. 

“Don’t tell me you’ve been having trouble with them?” Annette said to Ernest, who shook his head.

“It would not be your business if I was,” he said. “I would only have to let you know if someone else had won the honor, and seeing as I have no intention of giving up my post…”

Annette smacked him lightly on the back of the palm, and turned her attention back to Georgiana. 

“I have the most interesting gossip for you,” she said. “Speaking of cavaliers.”

“When do we not?” Georgiana quipped, and then the tea arrived, and there was a general shuffle of disruption as the cart was disassembled and reassembled on the table between them.

“It is really more Ernest’s story to tell,” Annette admitted as she served herself. Connor took it upon himself to make up Georgiana’s plate, making use of all the space on the porcelain saucer and finally sitting beside her. Annette’s knowing look was more conspiratorial than teasing, even as Georgiana took a bite from Connor’s fingers. Unsaid for the sake of Connor and Ernest’s dignity was the fact that cavaliers needed to be babied, coddled, allowed to indulge their protective instincts, relics of a bygone era where ladies were not perfectly safe. Ignored completely for the sake of everyone in Oakley Park’s nerves and general sanity was that Connor’s fear was not wholly baseless. He was her only defense. She may not have needed one, but if she did…

“You will tell it better,” he said. He eyed Connor like he wondered if Annette would allow the same amount of fussing, despite her lacking the pregnancy that justified Connor’s behavior. 

“Well,” Annette said, and took an enormous pause as she went about fixing her tea. Georgiana wouldn’t dream of pushing her, but if Annette had snuck her a glance or gone about the task with exaggerated slowness, she might have assumed it to be in jest. Now, she seemed uneasy.

Annette took her cup and saucer, and balanced it on her knee.

“Ernest’s sister found a fourth cavalier to contract with, but the contract was denied,” she said, stirring sugar into her tea.

The room was silent.

“By her mother? Or his?” Georgiana ventured. That was rare, but occasionally, mothers intervened. 

“By the local magistrate,” Ernest said, looking as if he’d eaten something distasteful. He hadn’t served himself yet. “So legally, he still belonged to his mother’s house, and could not move to Jane’s estate and be counted among her cavaliers. The magistrate said he would have him prosecuted for harassing Jane as a vagrant cavalier if he did not leave her be.”

Georgiana did not reach for Connor.

“Why? Did he give a reason?” She would be horrified to know it, doubtless.

“He said Jane should be content with three cavaliers, and that the attention of a fourth was a distraction from her duties.” By Ernest's recitation, it had to be verbatim. 

“What did the poor man do?”

“Left,” Ernest said. “Jane has heard no more from him.”

The silence lay in the room like some foul miasma. “How bold of the magistrate,” she said finally. “Can they appeal it?”

“Jane has been too distraught to consider it,” Ernest said. “And too wary of the man. He’s young, and appears to have an appetite for politics.”

Connor grunted dismissively. 

“I… do not think anyone could have told that well, let alone better,” Georgiana said cautiously. 

“There is, I think, no other way to tell it,” Annette said, without remorse. “But you ought to know.”

Georgiana went to reach for the tea, but thought better of it. Connor began to sort it for her.

“We should speak of something else,” Ernest said. Connor offered her a cup, and Georgiana took it, with no space in her lap to place it. “Annette is right, you ought to know, but lingering on it will be bad for your health.”

She was all too eager to dispel the cloud, and leave thinking of it for later that night, when restlessness plagued her.

“I have some dresses you might like,” Georgiana began. “I won’t be able to wear them for another year at least, and I hate to think of them folded away.”

Annette perked up considerably. “Oh, what _do_ you think the fashions will be like next year? And I will take them, gladly, but you will have mine when I next get a litter.”  
  
The conversation turned to fashion, and then trade, and disruptions to from the war, and then to various matters on both their estates. The cheeriness was exaggerated for her sake, but it was not fake. The afternoon passed quickly after all, and Georgiana considered extending the visit to an overnight, but there was the matter of Philip, who could not be invited inside when Georgiana had just the one cavalier, despite Connor’s likely lack of offense. Eventually, the sun began to tip towards the horizon and all four of them began their goodbyes, abandoning the sitting room for the entry hall once more, Georgiana supported on either side by Annette and Connor.

While Ernest took Connor out to meet Philip, waiting by the carriage, Annette embraced her, clinging tightly despite her belly between them.

“If you need anything- _anything_ \- you send me a letter,” Annette whispered. Georgiana blinked back sudden, unexpected tears, and they drew apart to arm’s length. Annette kept hold of her hands. “My aunts- my father’s sisters,” because Annette’s coloring gave away her sire easily, “Are always writing for me to visit, and given that we are not likely to be at war with them, and you have always wished to travel the world, have you not?”

“What lady ever felt wanderlust!” Georgiana laughed, but she was cheered by Annette’s fierce devotion, and wiped at her eye with the back of her hand. She saw Connor look back at them and frown, but he did not leave the other cavaliers, the three of the chatting about something. 

“The offer is there, Georgiana,” Annette said, and kissed her cheek. “Now, if I want to be home by sunset, I must leave you now. Please write.”

“Ladies Percy and Beldon first,” Georgiana said. And then she glanced aside, biting her lip. “And… Mrs. Moncrieff, I think. I have not seen her in person in years, and it will not be an intimate letter, but General Moncrieff is an acquaintance I have been cultivating for many years, and I ought to reaffirm my connection to her as well.”

“Better you than I,” Annette said, a tiny frown marring her otherwise lovely expression. “And I wish you the best of luck with her.”

It was Georgiana who embraced Annette this time, trying not to cling. She thought of all she might say now, things too childish and impulsive to put in ink. “Come back as soon as the litter is delivered? And stay for a night or two?”

“Of course!” Annette replied. “Your Connor will have run himself ragged enough by then to allow us in with no fuss, and your Richard,” she paused, but Georgiana will not flinch.

“Your Richard,” she continued smoothly, “-has always been of a most pleasing disposition, so I am sure he will be no trouble. And write your mama. She will visit if you ask, Georgiana.”

Georgiana realized she had tears in her eyes. “I- I do not want to make her deal with all the fuss,” she protested. 

They drew apart, and Annette reached into her reticule to pull out a small tin. “For your lip,” she said, and Georgiana nodded. Ernest called to them as the footmen finished loading the carriage with the baggage. 

“Remember,” Annette said, “if you need anything at all.”


End file.
